{"id":7977,"date":"2012-11-11T15:24:43","date_gmt":"2012-11-11T22:24:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/?p=7977"},"modified":"2012-11-11T15:25:13","modified_gmt":"2012-11-11T22:25:13","slug":"heart-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/2012\/11\/heart-2\/","title":{"rendered":"HEART"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/h1>\n

HEART<\/h1>\n

These rock goddesses refuse to mellow or slow down one bit \u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n
\n

Heart\u2019s Ann and Nancy Wilson\u00a0are on a tour bus somewhere outside Salt Lake City, heading for yet another concert on yet another stage. The duo expects to complete 55 dates this year; last year, they did 90\u2014two a week, nearly every week. So much for taking it easy after 35 years in the business and 35 million albums sold.<\/p>\n

Rockers are supposed to mellow with age, but Ann, 62, and Nancy, 58, have rarely done what they\u2019re supposed to do. No Great American Songbook for the sisters who set millions of heads banging with \u201cCrazy on You,\u201d \u201cBarracuda,\u201d\u00a0\u201cThese Dreams\u201d and \u201cMagic Man.\u201d \u201cAny time anyone says \u2018jazz standards,\u2019 it makes my butt tingle,\u201d says Ann. \u201cDo that, and\u00a0your rocking days are over.\u201d \u00a0\u201cWe wanted people to know we\u2019re not getting ready to take a dirt nap,\u201d says Nancy.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re still trying to save the world,\u00a0one song at a time.\u201d<\/p>\n

More tough than tender, their new album Fanatic<\/em> compares comfortably to anything on Little Queen<\/em> or Dreamboat Annie<\/em>. Ann wrote most of the songs on the tour bus. Not on tour\u2014just on the bus. While everyone else took a short break, she motored from L.A. to Cincinnati and back. \u201cIt was like being in a moving artist garret,\u201d she says. \u201cThere was nothing to do but write.\u201d The 10-song CD was recorded mainly in motel rooms up and down the West Coast. The sisters also recently penned their memoir\u00a0Kicking & Dreaming, A Story of Heart, Soul and Rock & Roll<\/em>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Has the digital world changed your creative process?<\/strong><\/p>\n

ANN: There was a time we would say, \u201cSomeday in the Jetsons future, we will be able to send each other a demo tape through the air.\u201d Now we do it all the time.<\/p>\n

NANCY: The creative part of this album was as old-school as we could make it\u2014sitting in a room, thinking out loud together, actually playing at the same time. Capturing and recording is done with modern technology, just because it\u2019s really hard to get a hold of a tape recorder anymore\u2014which is fine; we used to have to sit there and wait for tapes to actually rewind.<\/p>\n

ANN: We take advantage of the part that makes it easier to capture the music, and fight the cold, brittle sound of digital. There\u2019s something harsh about the way digital sounds, which, if you were born in the age of analog, you can really hear.<\/p>\n

NANCY: Also, with digital it\u2019s harder to be creatively decisive. For every edit and loop, every instant the possibility of changing your mind is right in front of you. We used to be forced to decide which take was best and build on it. Having everything at your fingertips is convenient but does not always help develop creative decision-making skills.<\/p>\n

ANN: The moment will always come when you have to say, \u201cNo, that\u2019s it, take your hands off.\u201d The songs have a voice\u2014they tell you what they want you to do.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How did writing a book differ from writing songs?<\/strong><\/p>\n

ANN: Writing a book is like therapy. When you\u2019re going over all that ground of being 13, when you figured your life was hell\u2014you have to pull out all the stops.<\/p>\n

NANCY: There were so many \u201caha moments\u201d about the connective tissue in the family. As a kid you tend to rewrite history. I wish I\u2019d kept a better personal journal. But the songs are like a diary.<\/p>\n

ANN: I\u2019m sure I\u2019ve forgotten tons of incredible stuff because I can\u2019t be bothered, or I\u2019m too much in the moment to sit down and go, \u201cLet\u2019s see, what happened today?\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Which song came easiest, which song was the hardest?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NANCY: The title song, \u201cFanatic,\u201d came easiest. I was jamming with Ben Mink, our producer, and the guitar riff that starts the song just came rolling right out of me. It felt larger than life and righteous and fun.<\/p>\n

ANN: I would say that \u201cDear Old America\u201d came the easiest for me. I had written a big ol\u2019 bunch of words on the bus\u2014all we had to do was find a swagger groove for it. It all fell into place. The hardest was \u201cMillion Miles.\u201d We were doing a tip of the hat to the old folk song \u201c500 Miles,\u201d but we didn\u2019t want to get too close to it. We wanted to\u00a0make it our own song.<\/p>\n

NANCY: The toughest for me was \u201cWalkin\u2019 Good,\u201d because that day I kept trying to text with my new boyfriend [now husband, Geoff Bywater] and could hardly pay attention in the studio. Ben Mink had to keep going, \u201cExcuuuse me. Could you please put your cellphone away and get to work?\u201d Also, I sing on that one and I\u2019m not the best singer in the world. I\u2019m a player who loves to sing.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In this case, a player who sings with Sarah McLachlan (on \u201cWalkin\u2019 Good\u201d). How did that come about?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NANCY: We played on her tour last year, and our producer is a friend of hers in Vancouver. She really liked the song and related to the theme of it.\u00a0 Plus she sounds really good on it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

An appeal to a more AAA audience?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NANCY: Yes, but that\u2019s also me. Usually there\u2019s a \u201cDog and Butterfly\u201d along with a \u201cBarracuda\u201d\u2014it\u2019s the yin and yang\u00a0of a rock band.<\/p>\n

ANN: We have a couple of songs on every album that are more mellow.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Is rock the music of youthful sexuality?<\/strong><\/p>\n

NANCY: When you\u2019re on a rock stage, it\u2019s timeless and ageless and very sensual.\u00a0I\u2019m more an adult and more\u00a0a teenager now simultaneously.\u00a0 Especially as a newlywed!<\/p>\n

ANN: Honestly, I feel freed up from\u00a0some of that stuff. I no longer labor\u00a0under the handicap of having to look like a little show pony. If I can go out there\u00a0and look my own beautiful way and do the best I can singing, then I\u2019m satisfied. And I couldn\u2019t have said\u00a0that 20 years ago.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s in your arsenal, and why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

ANN: I sing through a Sennheiser wireless mic\u2014we use them in the studio, too, but not wireless. I play a Gemeinhardt flute. I\u2019ve tried some wooden flutes that have a more beautiful sound, but they don\u2019t hold up to life on the road. So I play a Gemeinhardt student flute just like the kids in school band. And I play a custom Martin acoustic guitar\u00a0called the Cosmo, based on the Johnny\u00a0Cash black Martin.<\/p>\n

NANCY: There\u2019s a guitar I designed with Gibson in the \u201990s called the Night Hawk that I rediscovered and used on Fanatic<\/em>. It\u2019s a really strong guitar with the crunchiest, fattest sound. I use a bunch of different acoustic guitars, but mainly a custom-made one, and a Martin signature acoustic. The holy trinity: two acoustics and an electric.<\/p>\n

Clearly, the creative well is far from dry.<\/strong><\/p>\n

ANN: There\u2019s always a bunch of stuff hovering. If you\u2019re lucky enough to pull down the right one, a whole bunch of stuff comes down with it, and you\u2019ve got yourself a song that will get you really excited. It\u00a0comes easy after that.<\/p>\n

\u2013Ethlie Ann Vare<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HEART These rock goddesses refuse to mellow or slow down one bit \u00a0 Heart\u2019s Ann and Nancy Wilson\u00a0are on a tour bus somewhere outside Salt Lake City, heading for yet another concert on yet another stage. The duo expects to complete 55 dates this year; last year, they did 90\u2014two a week, nearly every week. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[5359,5355,5346,5348,5366,5365,5347,5357,5353,5351,5363,5362,2316,1879,5354,5352,5350,5364,5358,2317,81,5361,5356,5349,5360],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7977"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7977"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7977\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7981,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7977\/revisions\/7981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7977"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7977"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7977"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}