Heart Unite for New CD
Ann and Nancy Wilson are ready to begin recording again as Heart. This will end the band’s long hiatus, as Heart’s last album of new material was 1993’s Desire Walks On.
“It will be just the two of us this time,” Ann Wilson says. “We’ve never done it this way. We expect to play most of the instruments ourselves.”
The sisters appeared yesterday at a Seattle press event in support of the Groundwork anti-hunger initiative, and will perform in their new streamlined format this Friday night as part of the week-long festival. At the press conference, Nancy Wilson, the mother of one-year-old twins, compared notes with fellow Groundwork performer Dave Matthews, whose wife gave birth to twins this year.
During Heart’s break, Nancy scored several movies for her husband, director Cameron Crowe, while Ann toured with a Beatles tribute show and acted in The Vagina Monologues. The two have also appeared at benefits and special events, most notably the tribute to Brian Wilson (no relation) at New York’s Radio City Music Hall in March.
The new album is untitled and predominantly unwritten, but Ann says that she has about three “turkeys” (the sisters’ shorthand for new song ideas) ready to bring to the table. Nancy says she expects the results to be closer to the band’s Seventies albums than the power-pop efforts of the Eighties and Nineties.
In the meantime, the sisters are releasing Heart Presents a Lovemonger’s Christmas on November 13th. A repackaging of their indie-label holiday album, the ten songs include three traditionals and seven originals, with titles like “The Last Noel” and “Bring a Torch.”
While Beyond Records (Better than Ezra, the Go-Go’s) is releasing the Christmas album, the currently unsigned Heart aren’t sure where the new effort will land. “It could be Beyond, or it could be somewhere else,” Ann says. She then adds, gleefully, “Right now, we are free.”