WELL IT AIN’T VODKA –

June 15, 2022 –

Question: Heart started in Seattle, but had to go up to Canada for a minute. Did your time in Seattle or outside the states during a formative time for your music affect your songwriting?

Answer: Oh, yes, it really did. When I first started writing songs, it was up in Vancouver, BC, and we were living out in the country. So our first songs, “Magic Man” and “Crazy On You” and “Dreamboat Annie,” and all those songs on the first record were all written up in the woods in Canada. We didn’t start writing the “Little Queen” album or the subsequent albums until after we moved back down to the states. But I think that those early songs written up in Canada really have characters of their own. There’s a feeling of purity and wholesomeness that I used to get up there. And so you can feel that in some of those super early songs, like “How Deep it Goes” and “Here Song” and all that. 

Q: Tell me about your songwriting process. I think of “Barracuda” as an example. It seems like you have a reaction to something that happened in your life and you’re able to make a song out of it.

A: Yeah. For me, usually, it’s phrases that I think feed directly into the groove of the music. When a lyrical idea and a musical groove get married, it can be fantastic. Like in the song, “These Dreams,” that whole dream-like character of the lyrics against the rhythmic syncopated synth track really works well. We’re always searching for stuff like that, and when it presents itself, you just know it right away. It isn’t a thinking thing. It’s a feeling thing. It’s really special when that happens.

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