Stand Back

Wonder Woman: Amazon, not witch.

I heard "Stand Back" by Stevie Nicks this afternoon while driving and thought, "Hey, why haven't I written about this?"  You see, "The Wild Heart" was the very first album I purchased.  When I say album, I mean exactly that -- vinyl LP.  Anyone remember those?  Well, I was pretty young when this came out in 1983, but I had to have it.  I was truly mesmerized by Stevie Nicks -- especially in the video.  She had this amazingly perfect hair and the most stunning, flowing outfits.  She'd have these translucent shawls that she would drape around her shoulders and then lift her arms and spin around -- kind of in a mystical variation of Wonder Woman's transformation spin.  In the video, there must have been a huge wind machine blowing right at her, and I swear it looks like she is about to take off and soar -- which in my mind is a good thing.  Yeah, lots of people talk about her being (supposedly) a witch, but come on.  That is just nonsense.  Capes and shawls and gypsies and so forth mean you're a witch?  Of course.  Yeah.  What about capes on superheros?  Aha!  Philosophical question...

Anyway, back to the video and tune.  The video is simple, and we see Stevie singing right before our eyes, looking straight at us.  I think she also spins around in the "rain," too, which always made me sad as a child.  Now I think it's cool.  She has a group of perfectly choreographed dancers, which was very typical of the time.  They move together in synchronicity with the dance moves.  Today's videos can have much more complex dancing, but this sure was cool.  It was like a dance team.  As for the song, I think the first thing that struck me this afternoon was the awesome synthesizer in the beginning.  Later in the song, we hear this really cranking kind of electro-funk guitar line.  Between the synthesizers, guitar, and drums, I like to think of this tune as "Stevie Plugged In" or "Stevie Electrified."  It's kind of like plugging a giant power cable into her music.  Oh, and her voice sounds terrific on this, too.  My absolute favorite part is at the very end where she sings "why don't you taaaaaaaaaaaaaake me hoooooooome."  I swear she goes from chest voice to head voice -- just like an opera singer.  You can actually hear bits of this chest/head voice switch right before, when she sings, "well I need a little sympathy...STAND BACK...well I need to be standin' in...STAND BACK..."  It is just completely awesome.  When I was a little girl, I didn't even realize that it was her voice through this entire sequence.  Wow.  Still blows me away.  Supposedly, the tune was inspired by Prince's "Little Red Corvette."  I could almost see the similarity with the use of a synthesizer, but uh, not much more.  I definitely prefer "Stand Back."  No offense, Prince.