“Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” is Track 3 on Bella Donna, Stevie Nicks’ first solo album. It is a duet with Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers. It follows “Kind of Woman” and precedes “Think About It” in the album track order.
About the Song
Stevie provided harmony vocals on Tom Petty’s “Insider,” a track that he had written for her. But after recording the song together, Tom was so impressed by how it turned out that he decided to include the track on his 1981 album Hard Promises. Feeling guilty about the turnaround, Tom gave Stevie “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” instead.
“It’s funny, you get such preconceived ideas about artists. I knew Stevie, but not real well, and she’d been asking me for a long time for a song. I thought that ‘The Insider’ would be the thing for her, because it’s acoustic, it has that kind of feel. She really liked the song, so we went to do the vocal and she started to sing harmony every time. Because my track was playing in her headphones as a guide. So she said, ‘Just let me sing the harmony one time.’ So she did, and when it was over, I just sat there, in awe. She walked back in and said, ‘How was it?’ I said, ‘It’s a-mazing.’ She said, ‘I can tell by the look on your face, you don’t wanna give me this song. I’m giving it back to you right now.’ I really thought a lot of her for that.
“Then I went through this terrible guilt. Jimmy (Iovine) and I thought, we can’t take it back, because we promised it to her. So we went to her and said, ‘Stevie, what if we trade you another song for ‘Insider’? She said, play it for me, and we played her ‘Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around.’ She says, “Wow! That’s why I wanted YOU to write me a song — it’s rock ‘n’ rock, that what you do. ‘The Insider’ sounds like what I do.’ And I thought, how dumb of me to think that she’d want me to write like her. We’ve got some videotapes of those sessions that are very funny” (Marsh, 1981).
“Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” raced to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, boosting Bella Donna to No. 1 on the Billboard Top 200 Albums. The track remains Stevie’s highest charting solo single to date on the Billboard Hot 100.
Lyrics
Baby, you’ll come knocking on my front door
Same old line you used to use before
I said, yeah, well, what am I supposed to do
I didn’t know what I was getting into
So you’ve had a little trouble in town
Now you’re keeping some demons down
Stop draggin’ my
Stop draggin’ my
Stop draggin’ my heart around
It’s hard to think about what you’ve wanted
It’s hard to think about what you’ve lost
This doesn’t have to be the big get even
This doesn’t have to be anything at all
I know you really want to tell me good-bye
I know you really want to be your own girl
Baby, you could never look me in the eye
Yeah, you buckle with the weight of the words
There’s people running ’round loose in the world
Ain’t got nothing better to do
Than make a meal of some bright eyed kid
You need someone looking after you
I know you really want to tell me goodbye
I know you really want to be your own girl
Baby, you could never look me in the eye
Yeah, you buckle with the weight of the words
Stop draggin’ my heart around
Stop draggin’ my heart around
Stop draggin’ my heart around
(Tom Petty/Michael Campbell) © 1981 Gone Gator Music (ASCAP)/Wild Gator Music (ASCAP)
Release
On July 8, 1981, Modern Records released “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” as the lead single from Bella Donna. Coupled with “Kind of Woman” in the U.S., the single become a big hit, peaking at No. 3 (for 6 weeks) on the Billboard Pop Singles chart. The song’s accompanying music video was among the first music videos that aired on the MTV network in the summer of 1981.
“Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” remains Stevie’s highest Billboard-charting single as a solo artist.
| Billboard Chart | Peak |
| Pop Singles | 3 |
| Album Rock | 2 |
Reference
Marsh, D. (1981, July 1). Tom Petty. Musician, Player, and Listener.
Whitburn, J. (1995). Rock tracks: album rock 1981-1995. Record Research, Inc.
