Customer Reviews

Crystal Visions / Very Best (CD+DVD)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Love Stevie! When the woman was with Fleetwood Mac, she was amazing.. onher own sheè;s actually better! You gotta own this album!

Have always been a fan of Stevie Nicks and in this CD she really kicks it up. Worth the time to buys this CD and give it a listen too.

stevie you are one of a kind unforgatteblwe ina way . this built upon the other side of the mirror

Stevie Nicks, whether you love her or not, has made it in the tricky business of rock and roll. Her instantly recognizable voice, her mystical songwriting and stage persona, her knack for penning songs that were commercially viable while claiming some artistic depth... She is one of the few true originals of the rock era. She has succeeded in a way that not many of her peers - male or female - did before or since her. She remains to this day one of the very rare artists who managed to both front a legendary group (in Stevie's case, mega-band Fleetwood Mac) AND to establish a solo career in a very big and consistent way. Stevie Nicks wanted it all, she did it all, and "Crystal Visions" is a very honest attempt at capturing the essence of what this truly unique performer was all about.

This retrospective works on many levels, and fails on a few. It works mainly because it delivers most of the solo hits that she is associated with, like "Stand back", "Talk to me", "Rooms on fire", "Stop dragging my heart around", "Leather and lace", "Edge of seventeen" and so on. The package is thoughtfully designed, with lots of rare pictures and liner notes written by Stevie herself on all of the individual songs (except "Rooms on fire", a puzzling decision since it was one of her biggest solo charting hits). Many of her Fleetwood Mac hits are available, although usually not in their original form (a remix of "Dreams", live versions of "Rhiannon" and "Landslide", plus the original studio version of the achingly beautiful "Silver springs"). Stevie obviously knows that her die-hard fans already have everything, so it's thoughtful of her to include alternate versions of those Fleetwood Mac gems.

Also included are a couple of previously unreleased tracks; there is an outstanding live version of Led Zeppelin's "Rock and roll", and a live version of her own "Edge of seventeen" backed with a symphonic orchestra that makes the song even more haunting. She has also included a couple of songs from her brilliant 2001 comeback album "Trouble in Shangri-La"; so in short, this is far from being a mere rehash of her 1991 best-of compilation ("TimeSpace").

However... by trying to cover both bases (her solo career and her Fleetwood Mac years), the result falls predictably somewhere in the middle. A couple of important solo tracks are missing (namely the gorgeous "Has anyone ever written anything for you", minor chart singles such as "Nightbird" and "After the glitter fades", and there are no tracks from her sadly underrated 1994 album "Street Angel"). Including a few songs from Fleetwood Mac is interesting, but it also enhances the absence of quite a few of her best (and most popular) tracks with that band, like "Sara", "Gypsy", "Seven wonders" or "Gold dust woman". In the end, "Crystal Visions" winds up sounding like an incomplete overview of both her solo career and her Fleetwood Mac work. Maybe it's just a case of unrealistic expectations; it's well-known that regular customers are always the most difficult to please, and I certainly am a regular customer when it comes to Stevie Nicks !

All in all, "Crystal Visions" nonetheless offers a very honest look at the works of Stevie Nicks, regardless of who she recorded it with; casual fans will no doubt be highly satisfied with this retrospective, and die-hard fans such as myself already own everything there is to own about Stevie Nicks. A lot of time and thought was obviously put behind this retrospective, and it's certainly not a rip-off. Taken for what it is, "Crystal Visions" is a strong reminder of what made so many of us fall in love with her in the first place.

This said - die-hard fans would be wise to purchase the edition of "Crystal Visions" that also includes a DVD of all her solo videos, all of which feature amazing, insightful (and sometimes downright hilarious) audio commentary from Stevie herself. It's certainly worth paying the few extra bucks if you're a big Stevie Nicks fan.

This is the first Stevie Nicks compilation that has selections from both Fleetwood Mac and her solo career. All in all, they're done together really well. The Melbourne Symphony songs are absolutely AMAZING, the remix of Dreams is catchy, and Stevie still shows that she can rock out by covering Led Zeppelin's "Rock & Roll", probably the only woman who can pull off covering a Zeppelin song without getting a rise from original fans.

If you're a casual Stevie Nicks fan, there's a good selection here for you, and the symphonic "Landslide" is a necessity for any Stevie fan to add to their collection.

If you really want to get a good selection of Stevie's work, check out her "Enchanted" box set.

Stevie Nicks, whether you love her or not, has made it in the tricky business of rock and roll. Her instantly recognizable voice, her mystical songwriting and stage persona, her knack for penning songs that were commercially viable while claiming some artistic depth... She is one of the few true originals of the rock era. She has succeeded in a way that not many of her peers - male or female - did before or since her. She remains to this day one of the very rare artists who managed to both front a legendary group (in Stevie's case, mega-band Fleetwood Mac) AND to establish a solo career in a very big and consistent way. Stevie Nicks wanted it all, she did it all, and "Crystal Visions" is a very honest attempt at capturing the essence of what this truly unique performer was all about.

This retrospective works on many levels, and fails on a few. It works mainly because it delivers most of the solo hits that she is associated with, like "Stand back", "Talk to me", "Rooms on fire", "Stop dragging my heart around", "Leather and lace", "Edge of seventeen" and so on. The package is thoughtfully designed, with lots of rare pictures and liner notes written by Stevie herself on all of the individual songs (except "Rooms on fire", a puzzling decision since it was one of her biggest solo charting hits). Many of her Fleetwood Mac hits are available, although usually not in their original form (a remix of "Dreams", live versions of "Rhiannon" and "Landslide", plus the original studio version of the achingly beautiful "Silver springs"). Stevie obviously knows that her die-hard fans already have everything, so it's thoughtful of her to include alternate versions of those Fleetwood Mac gems.

Also included are a couple of previously unreleased tracks; there is an outstanding live version of Led Zeppelin's "Rock and roll", and a live version of her own "Edge of seventeen" backed with a symphonic orchestra that makes the song even more haunting. She has also included a couple of songs from her brilliant 2001 comeback album "Trouble in Shangri-La"; so in short, this is far from being a mere rehash of her 1991 best-of compilation ("TimeSpace").

However... by trying to cover both bases (her solo career and her Fleetwood Mac years), the result falls predictably somewhere in the middle. A couple of important solo tracks are missing (namely the gorgeous "Has anyone ever written anything for you", minor chart singles such as "Nightbird" and "After the glitter fades", and there are no tracks from her sadly underrated 1994 album "Street Angel"). Including a few songs from Fleetwood Mac is interesting, but it also enhances the absence of quite a few of her best (and most popular) tracks with that band, like "Sara", "Gypsy", "Seven wonders" or "Gold dust woman". In the end, "Crystal Visions" winds up sounding like an incomplete overview of both her solo career and her Fleetwood Mac work. Maybe it's just a case of unrealistic expectations; it's well-known that regular customers are always the most difficult to please, and I certainly am a regular customer when it comes to Stevie Nicks !

All in all, "Crystal Visions" nonetheless offers a very honest look at the works of Stevie Nicks, regardless of who she recorded it with; casual fans will no doubt be highly satisfied with this retrospective, and die-hard fans such as myself already own everything there is to own about Stevie Nicks. A lot of time and thought was obviously put behind this retrospective, and it's certainly not a rip-off. Taken for what it is, "Crystal Visions" is a strong reminder of what made so many of us fall in love with her in the first place.

This said - die-hard fans would be wise to purchase this edition of "Crystal Visions", which also includes a DVD of all her solo videos. Not only are some of these videos hard to find (like "Blue denim", "Sometimes it's a[...]", the original "Stand back" video and "Everyday"), but all of them feature amazing, insightful (and sometimes downright hilarious) audio commentaries from Stevie herself. Hearing her speak about these songs provides additional insight on the writing of these songs, but also enables the listener to witness Stevie's struggles with the many strains of being a recording artist in the "MTV era". Her audio commentary on the original "Stand back" is just so funny, it beats any sitcom - this woman has an uncanny sense of humor, she isn't afraid of laughing at herself, and it's something that her stage persona wouldn't necessarily indicate ! It's certainly worth paying the few extra bucks to get this DVD edition if you're a big Stevie Nicks fan.