Even though Fleetwood Mac is basically no more, their impressive discography is still listened to and loved today. Specifically, their massive hit Rumours from 1977 is always on the rotation of folk-rock lovers’ playlists, from oldheads to new fans.
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It’s an impressive feat to produce an album that has so much staying power almost 50 years after its release. But surprisingly, only one single from that iconic album ever hit no. 1 in the United States. And that song is “Dreams”.
On June 18, 1977, “Dreams” hit no. 1 on the Billboard US Singles chart. To this day, it’s still the band’s only no. 1 hit in the United States. It also hit no. 1 in Canada and sold over a million copies in North America upon its release back in 1977.
You’d think a song like “Dreams”, rife with emotion and the very particular feeling of having a partner who doesn’t think you’re enough, would have taken a lot of time and work to write. Surprisingly, it didn’t.
The Origins of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams”
Stevie Nicks and a number of other members of Fleetwood Mac were dealing with everything from lost love to divorce to infidelity to excessive drug abuse while working on Rumours. You can definitely hear that pain in the final cut of the album, and especially in the song “Dreams”. However, it really wasn’t that hard of a song to write, according to Nicks.
“One day when I wasn’t required in the main studio,” Nicks told the now-defunct Blender Magazine back in 2005. “I took a Fender Rhodes piano and went into another studio that was said to belong to Sly Stone, of Sly and the Family Stone. It was a black-and-red room, with a sunken pit in the middle where there was a piano, and a big black-velvet bed with Victorian drapes.”
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Nicks went on to say that the song only took 10 minutes to complete.
“I sat down on the bed with my keyboard in front of me,” Nicks continued. “I found a drum pattern, switched my little cassette player on and wrote ‘Dreams’ in about 10 minutes. Right away I liked the fact that I was doing something with a dance beat, because that made it a little unusual for me.”
Allegedly, the band didn’t love the song when Nicks first played it. Luckily, they were receptive to recording it. “Dreams” has since gone on to be one of their most recognizable and successful songs of Fleetwood Mac’s career.
Photo by Finn Costello
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