Bella Donna-1981

Bella Donna 1981

In the late 1970s, Stevie sought to create another outlet for her ever-growing catalog of music. "I was a mad songwriter," Stevie said in an interview in 1984. "I kept writing and there was no place for my songs on an album." Friend Paul Fishkin knew she could pull her own in the music industry, and set out get Stevie a solo record deal. In 1981, Fishkin created Modern Records, a label created solely for her solo work. He also garnered her a deal with Atlantic Records, and Stevie began the long process of recording another album only months after the Tusk tour had ended.

The album was entitled Bella Donna, also meaning "Beautiful Lady." Stevie didn't need to write new songs for the album; she culled the songs from ones she had written years earlier. "The one song that I wanted badly to go on the album was Blue Lamp, a song I wrote to show myself that I was still a songwriter without Fleetwood Mac," Stevie said in an interview with Rolling Stone. "It needed a home, and it went on the Heavy Metal soundtrack." Stevie worked with a variety of musicians and producer Jimmy Iovine provided Stevie with the tender force and discipline she needed to complete the album. She duetted with Don Henley on Leather and Lace, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on Stop Draggin' My Heart Around, and created musical collaborations with Roy Bittan, Waddy Wachtel, Russ Kunkel and others, including her backup singers Sharon Celani and Lori Perry.

The tour could have lasted for a year, easily. Stevie was propelled to the top by hits Stop Draggin'..., Edge of Seventeen and Leather and Lace. Yet she endured a heartbreaking setback she calls "such an upsetting situation." Her best friend and vocal coach Robin Snyder-Anderson had been diagnosed with terminal leaukemia. Stevie kept her tour short and predominantly performed only on the West Coast and the Midwest.