It’s 1988 and I’m 16 Years Old!

 

Left to right: Will, Carly, and Alexis (1988)

The year was 1988. I was 16 years old and just got my driver's license! 

I often borrowed my brother's dark blue Dodge Mirada and hit the town after getting home from high school. I was always so eager to get out and go beyond the boundaries of my small hometown. I used to travel 30 minutes down the road to Pennsylvania Western University, California. A place many people so lovingly called Cal U. This college town was full of a whole slew of interesting, educated, and open-minded young people. 

The first time I went to the campus was with a friend because Joan Jett was performing a small gig there in support of her sixth studio album Up Your Alley. I was a big fan and remember the concert being a lot of fun. We had to stand all the way in the back because we arrived late. It was standing room only. All I can remember now is that Joan looked great and sounded even better!

Around this time, I met some people I would become good friends with. The wonderful brunette to my left wearing the Wonder Woman bracelets is Alexis. She and I immediately formed a deep bond that would last a over decade. I'm happy to report that to this day we still talk occasionally online.

To my right is a guy named Will who's wearing a black sweater and pink turtleneck. I remember that he loved clove cigarettes and the band, The Cure. If you look closely at this picture, you can see that he's resting one of his clove cigarettes on the wooden balustrade handrail. After all, who didn't smoke back in the 1980s? I remember the residence where we took this photograph. It was at a place called "The Puzzle House" for reasons that are still unknown to me to this day.

As for my look here, well, I think I was going through my Madonna Desperately Seeking Susan / Samantha Fox phase. Although, one could just as easily argue that I look more like a member of Def Leppard. 🤣 Pour some sugar on me, baby! God, I wish I still had that grey jacket!

I just wanted to share this photograph with you that I found at the bottom of a drawer. It made me smile. 

Author Sydney Banks once wrote "The past is no longer real. It's just an illusion." But when I look at this photo in my mind it's 1988, I'm 16 years old, and I just got my driver's license.

xoxo 💋 - Carly

Stevie Nicks “If Anyone Falls” Gets a FRESH Makeover as a DUET Cover by Pittsburgh Band 🎩 🎵

 

If Anyone Falls: A Video Essay/Round Table Discussion

Hi, I'm Hoyt. And I'm Carly. And we are Candy Apple Blue. Today, we're going to be taking a deep dive into the song, If Anyone Falls, as recorded by Stevie Nicks and co-written by Sandy Stewart. The song peaked at number 14 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 charts in November of 1983. It was off her second solo album, The Wild Heart. In the fall of 1982, Stevie began composing and preparing new material for her follow-up to her Billboard No. 1 smash solo album, Bella Donna. Bella Donna yielded three huge hits, Stop Dragging My Heart Around with Tom Petty, the Don Henley duet Leather and Lace, and the haunting Edge of Seventeen. The 1980s was a very busy time for the white-winged dove songstress. Not only was her solo career taking off into the stratosphere, she was also keeping her commitment to her band Fleetwood Mac, which made her a star and put her on the map.

Hear the classic Stevie Nicks song If Anyone Falls reimagined as a duet by Pittsburgh indie synth-pop band Candy Apple Blue. If Anyone Falls was the second single off of Stevie Nicks second solo studio album The Wild Heart. Released in 1983 it also features the worldwide smash hit single Stand Back. This big 1980s synthesizer-heavy US rock song peaked at number 14 on the Billboard Hot 100 charts and has become a staple of her concerts.

This song has always enchanted us. Its haunting melody and mystical powers have stayed "deep inside" of our hearts for 41 years.

Stream or download "If Anyone Falls" here: https://song.link/i/1787631902

Listen here on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_xzRl_fGBo

Buy on Bandcamp: https://candyappleblue.bandcamp.com/track/if-anyone-falls

Produced by Candy Apple Blue
https://candyappleblue.music

Lead vocals by Apollo Rogers
https://www.facebook.com/ApolloRogersSings

Lead vocals by Nick Bramlett
https://www.facebook.com/TheNickBramlett

Written by Stevie Nicks & Sandy Stewart

Synthesizers, bass, and drums programmed & performed by Carly Emerick

Electric and acoustic guitars performed by Micah Blakeslee
https://linktr.ee/MicahBlakeslee

Audio and recording engineer: Carly Emerick

Mixed and mastered by Math Bishop
https://www.mathbishop.com

If you like the music that we make and want to support our efforts you can do so here:
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/CandyAppleBlue

#stevienicks #ifanyonefalls #80smusic #80spop

If Anyone Falls was written in a similar fashion as Stand Back. Stevie Nicks composed what is known as a top line in the recording industry. Many of today's artists, like Taylor Swift, for example, will be sent an instrumental by a beatmaker or a music producer and she will then go in and record a top line. As has been well documented, she wrote the song Stand Back in a similar fashion where she wrote the lyrics over top of Little Red Corvette after hearing it on the radio. Writing a top line means composing the lyrics and vocal melodies over top of a pre-recorded piece of music. This style of songwriting proved to work well for Stevie on Stand Back, so she wanted to try it again. Gordon Perry, a record producer from Dallas, Texas, was a close friend of Stevie's and heard that she was looking for new material for her second solo album.

It was at that time that he came across the demo by then-unknown artist Sandy Stewart. The first track on this demo was a song called The Last American. He instantly fell in love with this instrumental and knew that Stevie would too. So we forwarded the cassette tape to her. Stevie remembers going into the bathroom the night she received the tape with Sandy Stewart's instrumental on it. She liked the way the acoustics of a small tiled room made her voice sound, so she would go there for inspiration. With this magical instrumental filling the room, she grabbed her portable cassette tape recorder and began to sing in the top line for If Anyone Falls. What came out of this was a first-time collaboration with Sandy Stewart, not even being in the same room. Stevie has often referred to this time period of writing, The Wild Heart, as the love time of her life, when everyone around her was either falling in love or out of love, getting married or getting divorced, including her. It was a time when you could walk into a room and fall in love with a total stranger. Sandy Stewart has a very sophisticated writing style, which is evident when you look back at her songwriting catalog, most notably songs that feature Stevie Nicks as the vocalist. Songs like Seven Wonders, Too Far From Texas, and Maybe Love Will Change Your Mind are songs that she's contributed to Stevie's enduring catalog. The two worked together closely on the Wild Heart and Sandy Stewart's solo album.

Sandy's an incredibly gifted songwriter and vocalist who's often drawn comparisons to Stevie herself.

Candy Apple Blue - If Anyone Falls (Juno Dreams Remix)
ft. Apollo Roges and Nick Bramlett