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Fleetwood Mac is one of the most famous classic rock bands in the world, but Jefferson Airplane singer Grace Slick can’t stand seeing them perform. Here’s why Slick “couldn’t look at” Fleetwood Mac on stage, and what she thinks of Stevie Nicks.

A black and white photo of Jefferson Airplane's Grace Slick, who gave her opinion on Fleetwood Mac, smiling into the camera.
Grace Slick | McCarthy/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Jefferson Airplane singer Grace Slick said Fleetwood Mac is too ‘old’

Grace Slick, the former singer of Jefferson Airplane, said she couldn’t stand to watch Fleetwood Mac perform. It’s not because she doesn’t like their music or has an issue with any of the band members – it’s because she thinks they are all too “old.”

Slick, who retired from music at age 50, said she should have quit 10 years earlier than she did. She also thinks all musicians should retire around the same age. 

“There’s something about old people singing rock’n’roll lyrics that bothers me – it just doesn’t match,” Slick told WENN (via Louder Sound). “I saw a film of Fleetwood Mac doing something, and I was okay as long as I didn’t look at them. I couldn’t look at them. They sounded great, and if I looked away and imagined young people singing I was okay with it.”

But there is one classic rock band the “White Rabbit” singer thinks can pull off a fantastic performance. “The only so-called old people I’ve seen that I thought ‘that still works’ is the Rolling Stones,” she said. “They did a thing that was filmed in a park in Great Britain, and the way they acted, the way they sang, the musicianship, just worked really well.”

Grace Slick has complimented Fleetwood Mac singer Stevie Nicks

The brutally honest Jefferson Airplane singer has also commented on Stevie Nicks, a singer and songwriter for Fleetwood Mac.

Grace Slick was once asked what she thought of Nicks during an interview. “Stevie Nicks has written some of the best rock songs,” she complimented her fellow singer (per Society of Rock). “I don’t know her that well, but I like that strange little person that she’s decided to be.”

Slick added, “A…somebody from some fairy story, and I thought that was great. She also writes some great songs.”

Stevie Nicks idolized the Jefferson Airplane singer and even wrote a song for her

While Grace Slick might think Stevie Nicks and the rest of Fleetwood Mac are too “old” to perform, the “Rhiannon” singer idolized the Jefferson Airplane star.

During a Q&A with NPR’s Ann Powers at SXSW Music, Nicks listed Slick among the artists who have influenced her the most. She recalled her early days of performing in San Francisco in the late 1960s, when she and her then-boyfriend Lindsey Buckingham opened for Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. 

“Flamboyance and attitude from Janis, humbleness and grace from Hendrix, and a little bit of slinky from Grace Slick,” Nicks said (via Rolling Stone). “Those were the three people who I emulated when I was on stage.”

And in March 2009, during a Fleetwood Mac show in Montreal, Nicks revealed that one of the band’s most famous songs, “Gypsy,” was heavily influenced by Grace Slick. “‘So I’m back to the velvet underground’ – which is a clothing store in downtown San Francisco, where Janis Joplin got her clothes, and Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane,” Nicks explained the lyrics (per Rock Celebrities). “It was this little hole in the wall, amazing, beautiful stuff.”

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