“Blue Lamp” is Track 16 on the Heavy Metal Motion Picture Soundtrack (1981).
About the Song
“Blue Lamp” is completed track from the Bella Donna recording sessions (1980-1981). Although the track was one of Stevie’s favorites, it wasn’t included on the album. “‘Blue Lamp’ is one of my very favorite songs. ‘Blue Lamp’ was written about a blue lamp that my mother gave me when I first joined Fleetwood Mac, very heavy leaded glass lamp that I carried on an airplane home with a friend of mine. She carried the base and I carried the shade home to L.A., and we were really afraid it was going to get broken because it was kind of a leaded glass lamp. They didn’t want us to take it on the plane because it was too big. Well, we got it on the plane by screaming and yelling and and crying, and so that is the lamp that I carried from my mother’s home.
“It became and has remained my favorite possession. It is the one thing that never changes. It is without a doubt the light that shines, the only light that shines through the shining night much of the time for me. And the blue lamp was supposed to be on the cover, the picture of the blue lamp. And I decided to change the cover so there are some very, very wonderful pictures of this group of women in this room and stuff around this blue lamp, so someday those pictures will come out and you’ll get to really see the blue lamp ’cause it really is the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen. It looks like a huge blue mushroom, and it’s a wonderful thing for my mom too because it’s all so real even though it sounds like a sort of a gothic, fairytale song, you know. It’s totally real. Every line in it is real.”
The film Heavy Metal debuted in movie theaters on Friday, August 7, 1981.
Lyrics
There was no message to be found anywhere in sight
Inside or out
I had looked everywhere but the only lamp left on in the house
Was a blue light, a blue light
I was not ready, I’m no enchantress well I was too proud
Go find some Christmas angel then give that to her
If that’s what she wants, guardian angel
Guardian, if you were wiser you would get out
Downstairs the big old house is mine
Upstairs where the stars still laugh and they shine
Downstairs where the big old house is mine
Outside where the stars still laughin’
Stars still laughin’ shinin’
Stars still laughin’ cryin’ shinin’
Stars still laughin’ cryin’ shinin’
Stars still laughin’ shinin’ shine!
Don’t listen to her listen through her
Some Christmas angel
Huh freedom well give that to her ooh
Well is that what she wants guardian angel
Guardian if you were wiser you would get out ooh yeah
Ooh yeah ooh yeah ooh yeah ooh
And the light that shines through the shinin’ night
Is the lamp that I carried from my mother’s home
And the light that burns through the window pane
And the love remains
And the guardian of your challenge does not cry
(Stevie Nicks) © 1981 Welsh Witch Music (BMI).
Release
“Blue Lamp” appears on the following releases:
- Heavy Metal Motion Picture Soundtrack (1981) – Track 16
- Enchanted: The Works of Stevie Nicks (1998) – Disc 3, Track 11
- Bella Donna: Deluxe Edition (2016) – Disc 2, Track 10
- Complete Studio Albums & Rarities (2023) – Disc 9, Track 1
Pictures of the famous blue lamp, photographed by Herbert W. Worthington, III, appear on the “After the Glitter Fades” single cover and in the accompanying booklet for Enchanted: The Works of Stevie Nicks.
Reference
Nicks, S. (1981). Stevie Nicks Interview. Denis McNamara, interviewer, WLIR 92.7 FM
