Hard, Heavy and Worth a Mention 1976
Heart Dreamboat Annie 1976 (Mushroom Records)
Rock
Two sisters, a folky slant and some heavy crunch!
The Album
In the mid-1980s Heart were one of the most polished AOR bands around and like most AOR bands they had their roots in either soft rock, progressive rock or hard rock. Heart had been firmly embedded in the latter genre albeit with plenty of folk and when their debut album came out in 1976, the album was a fusion of both hard rock and folk rock. Long before the debut album though and as far back as the late 1960s, the band had formed under a series of different names and line-ups, and had been through a number of other twists and turns before arriving with the name of Heart, under the supreme leadership of the Wilson sisters Anne and Nancy. The debut album
Dreamboat Annie would be recorded under the Mushroom label and the unexpected success of the album, soon found the band at loggerheads with the label over the payment of royalties, a factor that would have them move to another label for the next album.
Dreamboat Annie was undoubtedly influenced by Led Zeppelin in both their hard rock and folky styles, and the album certainly went against the grain in what was expected from mainstream North American female singers of the time (just think Joni Mitchell, Carly Simon and Joan Baez as the norm) In fact one blast from “Crazy on You” one of the stellar tracks, showed us that Ann Wilson was aiming for something much tougher sounding than was expected, but was still able to retain the feminine clarity of her voice a la Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac. The rest of the album alternated around songs that had the hard rock guitar crunch of “Magic Man” and "Sing Child" and the folky delights of songs like the title track and “Soul of the Sea”. The simple fact of the matter was, that Ann Wilson was a talented rock vocalist over a range of styles and
Dreamboat Annie was able to show her and the band’s ability over the course of an album. Hindsight often sees reviewers painting a picture of early Heart being rough around the edges and a later Heart being polished and commercial. The simple fact of the matter is, that Heart from the word go were an extremely radio friendly band and found a niche for themselves in the US charts.
Ann Wilson- Vocals
Nancy Wilson- Guitar
Roger Fisher- Guitar
Howard Leese- Guitar
Steve Fossen- Bass
(Various Drummers)
Production- Mike Flicker