Fleetwood Mac's “Dreams”: The Strange and Beautiful Life of a Breakup Classic

Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Songs list is one of the most popular - and most-argued over - features the magazine has ever produced. It’s a trip through eight decades of pop music, from Elvis Presley to Elvis Costello, Aretha to Ariana, hip-hop to art-pop, and beyond. Its rankings are hugely influential, and - if you disagree enough with them, at least - infamous. In the first episode of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs podcast, hosts Brittany Spanos and Rob Sheffield dive into the history, significance, and weird quirks of the list, zeroing in on its most recent version, from 2021.
The hosts are joined by special guest and Rolling Stone staffer Angie Martoccio as they pivot to “Dreams,” the iconic 1977 Fleetwood Mac song that finished 9th on the most recent version of the 500 Greatest Songs list. In recent years, the Stevie Nicks masterpiece found new life - and a new audience - as a tik-tok mainstay and Gen-Z touchstone, but its history runs deep. The hosts delve into the fascinating story of the song, placing it within the context of the nonstop romantic drama that was Fleetwood Mac in the 1970s. Amazingly, Nicks wrote the song “in about 10 minutes,” as a mystical elegy to her fading relationship with Lindsey Buckingham. But its legacy is so much greater than that story would suggest - it’s a testament to making great art amid turmoil, and to the singular, shawl-clad sorcery of Stevie. “Dreams” sums up everything we love about her in four brilliant minutes.
00:00 Introduction to the Podcast
00:15 The Evolution of Rolling Stone's List
01:45 Personal Experiences with the List
02:23 The Impact of Songs Over Time
04:08 The Story Behind 'Dreams' by Fleetwood Mac
06:06 The Influence of Fleetwood Mac and Stevie Nicks
07:30 The Resurgence of 'Dreams'
08:39 The Legacy of Fleetwood Mac
21:13 The Impact of Fleetwood Mac on Modern Artists
24:44 Angie Martoccio Details What Makes the Song So Great
Apple: pod.link/1734617231.apple
Spotify: pod.link/1734617231.spotify
IHeartRadio: pod.link/1734617231.iheartradio
Others: pod.link/1734617231
Get the full story at: www.rollingstone.com/

[@doggiedogma4]

Lindsey's guitar use of the wah-wah on Dreams, like he is crying, sends the song into the stratosphere!

[@julieholbrook5302]

Stevie is a HUGE Edgar Allen Poe fan. She and Lindsey both are. Lindsey alludes to Poe in Say Goodbye when he wrote the lines "...a world within a world, a time within a time, just a dream, just a dream..."
They spent time reading Poe together when they were younger. Both reference his work within their own often. Lindsey and Stevie both have an endless appetite for drama. You nailed it. Their work is not that of mere love songs. They are sick-to-your-stomach, pain-to-the-depths-of-your-soul testament to a deep, visceral emotion coupled with a lack of closure and a flair for the dramatic.

[@gcshall2798]

Rumours was everywhere on my college campus in 1977. Many memories ❤ Looking forward to listening to all 500 songs.

[@CaitlinAC]

Sooo excited for this pod with you two!

[@shanecasebeer1364]

I got fully into Stevie Nicks as her carreer was starting to wane in the mid-80s, so it's great to see her various resurgences into the zeitgeist, because it vindicates being a fan during her "down times"

[@johnmartinezm]

The Chicks 😂😂😂

[@Yungbeck]

Nice! Let's do all 500 ! 😅 Good opener, All time classic and had the legendary resurgence via that dudes cranberry skating video 😂

[@jimmynz1100]

Talking of Rumours are you going to do an article on P Diddy ?

[@johnmartinezm]

Wait .. did she just say Stevie wasn’t about drugs??? 😂

[@markendicott6874]

So the "Soft-Rock Cocaine Enthusiasts" weren't about the drugs? You want to rethink that statement............?