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October 18, 2024 • 13 mins
KBCO Listener Favorite The Head And The Heart magically appeared in KBCO Studio C to promote their excellent new song, "Arrow." Band members Charity Rose Thielen, Matty Gervais and Kenny Hensley sat down with Bret to talk about Colorado's love for THATH and taking the kids to Red Rocks.
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Episode Transcript

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Speaker 1 (00:03):
I hope your week is excellent. I'm Brett Sonders. Welcome
back to the Brett Sonders Podcast. This week, the members
of the Head and the Heart, the band from Seattle,
appeared in kb CEO Studio C here in Colorado, and
I got a chance to talk with a few of them.
By the way, there's a brand new song called Arrow.
I can't play it for you right now because of

(00:23):
law reasons, but you can easily find it go to
kbco dot com. It's the Head in the Heart. But
these three are the brains and the brawn of the band.
We're in kb CEO Studio C. Hey, this is Brett Sonders.
I'm delighted to welcome half and I'm going to say
right now the better half of the Head and the Heart.
You know what, it's the Head and the Heart, but

(00:44):
these three are the brains and the brawn of the band.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
I'm not talking about We'll take it.

Speaker 1 (00:49):
Charity Rose Steele and Hya Charity, Meddie Gervais, Great to
see you, a guitarist extraordinaire. And Kenny Hensley. Hi, Kenny,
it's really nice to have you here back in Colorado.
A few of us were talking off the air before
this conversation that you are so loved here in Colorado.
You mentioned I think you mentioned charity, that we are

(01:11):
your number one market for people who do marketing.

Speaker 3 (01:14):
Yeah, I guess so. I mean it makes it.

Speaker 4 (01:17):
We were just talking about how it feels so much
like a like a sister city to where we all
you know, came from from the band Seattle and yeah,
I mean our entire career, shows here have always felt amazing,
and but.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
Number one, I wonder what the connection is.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
Why do you think I'd like to ask all three
of you, why do you think Denver loves you best?

Speaker 5 (01:41):
A lot of mountain based marketing campaign.

Speaker 6 (01:45):
Now, we have noticed over the years that the kind
of mountainous like outdoors cities, towns whatever you want to, yeah,
tend to really love us, whether that's Seattle or Portland
or Denver or like Burlington, Vermont, you know, kind of
like outdoorsy towns in the.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
Heart fitness towns. It's because we're fit. You are you
guys are well. I'm gonna say the fittest sex tet
in all of rock.

Speaker 7 (02:12):
You can we can we put that out on all
social media. I'd love it as soon as possible, that's
all yours. I understand there's a new record. I know
we're going to hear a new single called Arrow.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
But I understand that you're on Verb Records now, which
is great because in the future, I can think Verve Records.
I can think Louis Armstrong, I can think Ella Fitzgerald
and the Head and the Heart.

Speaker 7 (02:32):
Right.

Speaker 5 (02:32):
Pretty cool, pretty pretty dang cool.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Were you cognizant of that when you signed with Verb,
that that's the that's the label. The girl from Ipanema
san Getz and that's Drew Gilberto were on that label.

Speaker 5 (02:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
I mean, I think we were aware enough.

Speaker 6 (02:46):
I remember having meetings with them before we decided to
work with them, and they just talked about how how
many solo artists they had worked with over the years
as a label or you know, our A and R
folks individually, but and they just didn't have any bands
they wanted to work with. A band, a group of people,
and it's a label full of you know, legendary jazz
acts and singers and whatnot, and uh, we're kind of

(03:07):
disrupting that a little bit by coming in and and
uh being ourselves.

Speaker 5 (03:12):
In a way though.

Speaker 7 (03:12):
It's like it's it's it's like, uh, you know, those
those people, you know, as iconic as they are, Like
when you when you're going into an agreement like that,
you almost feel like, Okay, I need to step into
these shoes in whatever way that means for me. And
I feel like that, you know, people people like Lewis Armstrong.
I mean you're talking about like the you know, the

(03:32):
greatest legendary people of all time, and so, uh, it's
it's it's a nice way to kind of set yourself
up for Okay, how can I how can I be
my best version of myself? And and what does that
mean for the music that we're making as a band.
And it's kind of cool.

Speaker 4 (03:46):
So and I think it just makes for like more interesting,
more inspiring kind of collaboration with the label and us
and and just it's an interesting you know, and a
lot of their contemporary acts, you know, I mean they
have Phosphorus and who we just toured with totally, and
so there's a lot of you know, it's it's it's

(04:08):
there's a contemporary you know, like contingent that they're that
that's it feels a little bit more holistic. And also
they're they're kind of you know, taking some risks and
and spreading and you know the form of who who
the label is, and it's that's more interesting to me
because it's like, what do you do with the band?

Speaker 3 (04:25):
What do you you know? And how does this you know?

Speaker 4 (04:29):
Uh, you know, it's just it's just more interesting because
it's not it's not it's not like a straightforward you know.

Speaker 3 (04:38):
It wasn't like a I don't know, we can cut
this out like a.

Speaker 5 (04:41):
One to one kind of relationship.

Speaker 3 (04:43):
It's more of a it's not expected. I like that.
It's it's less expected.

Speaker 4 (04:48):
And that keeps it interesting for for everyone involved.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
Charity and Maddy. I was fascinated. I didn't know until
today that the two of you are married. Oh yeah,
And that's incredible to me because sometimes in rock history,
the marriages and rock bands work out talking heads sometimes
not so much Fleetwood mac right, So how did the
two of you keep it all together? Because I know

(05:12):
you have kids and there's that whole thing, and then
there are the politics of a band.

Speaker 2 (05:18):
Is there a band therapist?

Speaker 3 (05:19):
I'm wondering there's a band therapist? Yeah?

Speaker 4 (05:23):
Yeah, we don't bring our marital ish there. But I
guess you know, it's part of our identities and the
intersectionality of who we are. Uh, it's it's a it's
kind of it's kind of insane, but and it's it's
it's not for the faint of heart.

Speaker 5 (05:38):
But you know, we definitely don't recommend it.

Speaker 4 (05:40):
To you, but we're grateful that, you know, Yeah, we're
making it work, and we're you know, feel the support
of the collective of this band, you know, and we're
all working together and figuring figuring it out a day
at a time.

Speaker 6 (05:58):
Really, but it's I mean being a member, being a
member of the band that's not married to either of
these two the three of you were, no I could
speak for for for.

Speaker 5 (06:11):
Them in a sense.

Speaker 6 (06:12):
I mean, watching it from the outside, I feel like
I feel like they're just really incredible and and like
you said, or like Charity said, they have two sweet
little girls, and because they're both in the band, they
also come out on tour with us. They can't leave
the kids at home, and so it's kind of created
this familial like energy with touring and and and everything,
and you know, it's it's really inspiring to see how

(06:33):
much of.

Speaker 2 (06:33):
The kids love Red Rocks.

Speaker 7 (06:35):
Oh my god, they Love, Love, Love Love red rocks
like all the backstage rooms, rocks embedded in the walls,
and oh my god, the whole place is a playground.

Speaker 4 (06:45):
And then the rest of the kids, you know, of
the other band members, they always come out and so
it's like a little reunion for them too.

Speaker 1 (06:53):
So tell me about this new album. Do we have
a title a working title for the album?

Speaker 3 (06:58):
We were.

Speaker 5 (07:01):
Allowed to say.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
In trouble, but I'll bet it's a phenomenal title. What
was the session like the sessions, like, what was the
energy like going into the studio, Because I know that
a lot of you were scattered in different parts of
the country, so every time you get together to record
or perform, it's something of a reunion, right.

Speaker 7 (07:22):
Yeah, it was actually a really really rewarding kind of approach,
I would say. Like, so, when we were still sort
of on maternity paternity leave at the beginning of the
middle like spring of last year, Kenny, John Tyler and
Chris got together and kind of in Richmond in Richmond, Virginia,

(07:45):
which and did a session and wrote like a great
handful of songs that kind of set the tone for
how we would we would end up approaching the rest
of the sessions where like everyone would just kind of
show up and Kenny should be describing this because you
were there that first day, but like everyone would show
up and kind of just start listening to each other
and come up with, you know, arrangements for songs, and

(08:08):
a lot of like complete songs came out of this.
Like however many day long session five days or something
like that.

Speaker 6 (08:14):
Yeah, yeah, and it was a couple of different sessions.
We did, like a couple five or six day sessions
the four of us before you two came in, And yeah,
I feel like we had had laid the foundation to
a handful of songs, and so we were not only
able to go in our have Charity and Maddie come
in and help finish those, but we had this kind
of energy already already rolling and happening because we had
we were already underway, you know. And yeah, super collaborative record.

(08:38):
I feel like we were all in there every day
together and none of the songs would have come out
the way they have, I think without all of us
being in there together doing that.

Speaker 7 (08:47):
So we ended up going like back and forth between
Richmond and Seattle, Washington at Studio Litho where the first
two records were recorded and kind of at a like
for like a week at a time, and it would
be the same approach where you know, we just start
listening to each other and at the end of the
day we'd maybe have like the structures for like two
or three songs, and then some of those would go
back home and work on at home and then bring

(09:08):
back for the next time we got together, and they'd
slowly take shape and just we ended up with this
like kind of massive catalog that we then had to
call from to figure out what made up the actual album.
But it felt like like so a lot of the record,
a lot of the songs that ended up on the record,
the performances are actually from the day they were written.

Speaker 5 (09:29):
They're super fresh.

Speaker 7 (09:31):
People barely know the song yet, and so there's that
still initial spark that's in there, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (09:35):
So that's still exciting for you Yeah, yeah, yeah, and.

Speaker 3 (09:38):
I think exciting to listen to.

Speaker 4 (09:40):
You can hear that energy, you know, I mean, it's
there's like that magical uncertainty is it's happening, and just
capturing that freshness you know, translates you know, to your
ears and in a powerful way. It really was such
a fulfilled, like feel so inspired and fulfilled by this

(10:03):
process that we did. Because we're all producers, we're all
and there's multiple writers, you know in this band, like
Kenny's lyrics and vocals on this album, Tyler same. You know,
it's like there's so many voices and people kind of
moving and morphing their roles as it just felt natural

(10:23):
to do, you know. So this is very much this
band in a room writing and recording music.

Speaker 6 (10:30):
Well, one thing I think that we did differently this
time around that was really nice is that we instead
of going in for like an entire month in the
studio and just booking three or four weeks or even
longer and kind of forcing a record out of that,
we did a lot of like five to seven day chunks,
but kind of broke them up so that each each
individual trip felt like like we still were able to

(10:52):
hold on to that kind of excitement of it being
new and feeling new, rather than being two or three
weeks into a studio session where we're all burnt out,
everybody count down the days to get home and you
don't really want to be there. This time around, I
could say that every single trip. There was at least
at least most of the time we were active and
working and productive rather than just sitting around killing time.

Speaker 1 (11:13):
Well, it sounds to me that the whole situation was
such a great collective experience. I can guess that the
album will not be titled The Head v. The Heart right,
it's not the title very much.

Speaker 5 (11:27):
Working together.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
It is so nice to meet the three of you,
Charity and Maddie and Kenny. And I was telling you
a few minutes ago you're the nicest people.

Speaker 2 (11:38):
I mean, you know, I meet some real monsters in
this format. Everybody's great, but no, you're really lovely people.

Speaker 1 (11:45):
And I can see the way the six of you
interact in the band that you have something very solid
and beautiful.

Speaker 2 (11:51):
And we wish you all the luck in the world.

Speaker 1 (11:53):
Now, the album is coming out, and I'm assuming you'll
be touring in twenty twenty five and perhaps we'll see
more Red Rocks. Did you know that you have sold
out Red Rocks seven times?

Speaker 7 (12:05):
It's so mind boggling, it's so insane, like looking at
the crowd and being like, I can't believe we're doing
this tonight, and then we're gonna do it tomorrow night too,
and we did it last year and it's just like
it's one of those things that just never gets old.
It never stops like flooring you at like how incredible
that is. And to have that kind of shared experience
with everyone that comes, you know, it just feels like
a big family.

Speaker 2 (12:26):
It's the best.

Speaker 5 (12:27):
It really is.

Speaker 1 (12:28):
So we can expect I shouldn't commit you here, but
hope we will see you back here in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 6 (12:34):
You can expect us to be at Red Rocks in
the future for sure. We can't say much about twenty
twenty five yet, but we will recording and that's that's
definitely going to be happening. We just yeah, can't say
much about dates yet.

Speaker 2 (12:46):
Sounds good. The Head on the Heart thank you for
stopping by KBCO Studio. See we so appreciate you.

Speaker 5 (12:50):
Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (12:52):
Thank you again to one half of the Head and
the Heart. I'm Brett Saunders. Make sure you subscribe to
the Bread Saunders podcas Cast and I'll see you next time.
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