When Waylon Jennings and his wife Jessi Colter released their 1981 album, Leather and Lace, he commissioned Stevie Nicks to write a song for the album. She penned the title track for Jennings and Coulter to sing as a duet, but when the song wasn’t used on the album, Nicks ended up recording it with Don Henley on her solo debut, Bella Donna.
“I wrote it for them, and I wanted them to do it,” said Nicks of the song. “Waylon Jennings asked me to write a song called ‘Leather and Lace.’ … So I did, and I spent a lot of time on the psychology of the man and the woman in the music business, both being stars in their own right and trying to live with each other and work and give Waylon a break and let him be a little weaker for a minute and let Jesse be a little stronger for a minute. This is what I was searching for even then.”
She continued, “I was writing about Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter, but I was writing about me and Lindsey [Buckingham, of Fleetwood Mac]. And I was, at that point, going out with Don Henley, and I was writing about Don and me. I was writing about the few couples that I knew and what they went through to try and work it out.”
Nicks said that she felt that either Waylon had to sing it with Jessi or she would with Henley. She would have even recorded it with Jennings. “I had to do it,” said Nicks. “Those were the only three possibilities for that song to be done. It was the most disciplined song I had ever written, and I had to finish it.”
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“Gold Dust Woman” (1978)
A few years earlier, Jennings also covered another Nicks classic, Fleetwood Mac’s “Gold Dust Woman” from their 1977 epic Rumours, for his duets album with Willie Nelson, Waylon and Willie. The album went to No. 1 and remained on the Country chart for 126 weeks.
“Rhiannon” (1985)
Years after Waylon and Willie, Jennings went further back into the Fleetwood Mac catalog to the band’s 1975 self-titled album, and first with Nicks and Buckingham, with a cover of “Rhiannon” on his 1985 album, Turn the Page.
Jennings recorded Turn the Page while he was completely drug-free, kicking cocaine cold turkey and moving to Arizona with Colter, and their song Shooter for a cleaner start.
“I hit better notes now that I wasn’t plagued with laryngitis,” said Jennings in his 1996 memoir, Waylon. on recording during this period. “I played on the beat instead of ahead of it. Probably only I noticed that instead of pushing myself, I was being pulled along by my own legend and the skills I’d learned from a lifetime performing.”
“Songbird” (2025)
In June 2025, Shooter Jennings released his father’s cover of the Christine McVie Fleetwood Mac classic “Songbird,” the title track of a previously unheard collection of songs recorded by Waylon and his band the Waylors in between touring from 1973 through 1984. By the early ’70s, Jennings had won the battle with RCA for creative control over his work and had artistic freedom to record on his terms.
“Songbird” was likely recorded sometime between 1977, when Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours was released, and the early ’80s. Shooter added a few subtle touches to the original recording of “Songbird” with backing vocals from country singers Ashley Monroe and Elizabeth Cook, along with a music video featuring archival footage of his father’s 44th birthday party in Nashville.
Songbird is the first of three albums recorded by Waylon, which Shooter is releasing within the next few years. Dubbed the Songbird project, the songs were compiled during the summer of 2024 when Shooter began mining hundreds of recordings by his father.
“’Songbird‘ is the beginning of Waylon’s return to the modern world,” said Shooter Jennings. “This is the first of three gifts from me to you: the fans that have kept my father’s voice, songs, and legacy alive all these years. The next few years are going to be full of some of the most exciting musical moments that the world never knew they were going to hear. I hope that these records bring the kind of joy to you that they have brought me.”
He added, “This project has given me an entirely new chapter in my relationship with my father, and working on this music has brought a whole new understanding about how, when and why my dad made music. The hard work is there on the tapes, and the passion and the soul within is as alive today as it was the day it was recorded.”
Photo: Tom Hill/Getty Images
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