Edge of Seventeen (Just Like The White Winged Dove)

"Edge of Seventeen (Just Like the White Winged Dove)" is a song written and recorded by American singer Stevie Nicks, the third single from her successful 1981 solo debut album Bella Donna. Written by Nicks to express the grief resulting from the death of her uncle Jonathan and the murder of John Lennon during the same week of December 1980, the song features a distinctive, chugging 16th-note guitar riff, and a simple chord structure typical of Nicks's songs.

Released as a single in early 1982, it just missed out on the Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100 making #11 and the live version on the B-side reached #26 on Billboard's Top Tracks chart. The album track had previously made the Top 5 of Billboard's Mainstream Rock chart in 1981, peaking at number four. It is one of Nicks' most enduring and recognizable songs, and has been covered by many artists. The distinctive riff was sampled by Destiny's Child in their 2001 song "Bootylicious", with Nicks in a cameo appearance in the music video, playing a guitar.

Read more about Edge Of Seventeen (Just Like The White Winged Dove):  Inspiration, Composition, In Popular Culture, Chart Positions

Famous quotes containing the words edge, seventeen, white and/or winged:

    Life is a travelling to the edge of knowledge, then a leap taken.
    —D.H. (David Herbert)

    The longer a woman remains single, the more apprehensive she will be of entering into the state of wedlock. At seventeen or eighteen, a girl will plunge into it, sometimes without either fear or wit; at twenty, she will begin to think; at twenty-four, will weigh and discriminate; at twenty-eight, will be afraid of venturing; at thirty, will turn about, and look down the hill she has ascended, and sometimes rejoice, sometimes repent, that she has gained that summit sola.
    Samuel Richardson (1689–1761)

    ... two great areas of deafness existed in the South: White Southerners had no ears to hear that which threatened their Dream. And colored Southerners had none to hear that which could reduce their anger.
    Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 16 (1962)

    But at my back I always hear
    Time’s winged chariot hurrying near;
    And yonder all before us lie
    Deserts of vast eternity.
    Thy beauty shall no more be found,
    Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
    My echoing song: then worms shall try
    That long preserved virginity:
    And your quaint honor turn to dust,
    And into ashes all my lust:
    The grave’s a fine and private place,
    But none, I think, do there embrace.
    Andrew Marvell (1621–1678)