Rod Stewart, Stevie Nicks co-headline new rock tour

Published 5:00 am Sunday, March 20, 2011

Rod Stewart clearly has a weakness for women: The British rocker, 66, has fathered eight children with five women.

So when three of his daughters — Kimberly, 31, Ruby, 23, and Renae, 18 — suggested Stevie Nicks as a touring mate for their father’s latest tour, Stewart listened. The pair will co-headline the “Heart and Soul Tour,” which opens today at BankAtlantic Center in Sunrise, Fla.

“I wanted to do a tour with someone, and they all love her, and she’s an icon, and so that’s how it happened,” Stewart said in a joint telephone conversation with Nicks.

Nicks is in Los Angeles, flush from a visit to the “Glee” set, where the cast sang her Fleetwood Mac classic “Landslide.” Stewart is in England working with old partner Jeff Beck on new tunes. The two rockers burn through the phone lines like old friends, though before this tour, Nicks says she and Stewart had only met twice before, once “at a fantastic New Year’s Eve party Rod had at his beautiful house” in the 1970s and another time at a rehearsal studio.

“I can’t remember anything in the ’70s,” Stewart says, laughing.

When the two hit the phone, much catching up is at hand. Not surprisingly, the baby gets top billing. In February, Stewart’s third wife, Penny Lancaster, gave birth to their son Aiden. Apparently, Stewart’s growing catalog of romantic standards albums has done the trick.

Nicks can’t wait to see the baby: “How’s the baby? Is he good?”

“He’s fabulous! An extremely handsome lad!”

Baby banter out of the way, the two talk about the tour — except there’s not too much to talk about. Rehearsals, set for a soundstage in West Palm Beach, hadn’t begun.

“Until we get to Florida to do several days of production and rehearsal, we don’t really know. We have songs we are sort of leaning toward but we’re not sure yet,” Nick says.

Nicks will perform a set of solo and Fleetwood Mac hits, followed by a Stewart set in which he promises to dig into his rock catalog. At some point during the three-hour-plus show, the raspy blonds will sing together.

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