Concert Reviews

The Head and the Heart at Massey Hall

Photo by Neil Van (2014)

As the stage was darkened a neon sign on the far right of the stage flickered to life flashing word-by-word “Signs of Light”, the title of their just released third album, as the crowd at Massey Hall roared. The front rows emptied as fans swarmed to the edge of the stage and the band members of The Head and the Heart came out and assumed their positions. From the get go they made everyone feel welcome as they humbled us by saying they were a lucky band from Seattle. The show started off with their lead single off their newest album All We Ever Knew, which energized the building as people clapped and sung the “la, la, la’s” during the song. Their set was an interesting mix of time periods, seeming to resemble an outdated 1980’s public access television chat show. A drab mustard yellow backdrop hung behind the band and a dozen fake plastic plants littered the stage. Bassist Chris Zasche completed the aesthetic by wearing a Hawaiian shirt with a beret and a big bushy beard, all he was missing was a pipe. Half a dozen glowing orbs gently flickered through some of the songs.

While the song Ghosts from their 2011 debut self titled album has a playful bounce to it, the live version had an almost ragtime meets carnival composition to it, with Kenny Hensley’s piano playing having a Scott Joplin influence. The band seemed to enjoy playing this song as they danced around playfully and slid across the hardwood floor. In his raspy voice, lead singer Josiah Johnson, thanked the crowd for coming out and tussled his hair out of his face in such a way you could almost hear an audible swoon from the females in attendance.

The band took a long quiet brake in order to regroup and change guitars before launching into a one two punch of Another Story and Let’s Be Still, the two best tracks off their 2013 album also called Let’s Be Still. During the aforementioned song the band slowed the pace down to a crawl before bringing it back up to maximum speed as everyone furiously played the tender song before abruptly cutting it off after Johnson shouted one more “Just for a moment, let’s be.”

The band continued to laud the city, something that always brings out Toronto’s well-known inferiority complex, guitarist Jonathan Russell talked about how that morning when he woke up in a parking lot, like you normally do when you sleep on a tour bus, he left the vehicle and saw this amazing vista of this beautiful city. Going back to their debut album to play Lost in My Mind the incomparable Massey Hall was turned into the Grand Ole Opry as the band went full on Nashville country pop. Every time co-lead singer Charity Rose Thielen sung a verse the crowd cheered wildly making the first few lines always indecipherable.

The band all left the stage for a bit while Johnson played a solo version of Oh My Dear on electric guitar featuring a very bluesy composition. When the band came out after Thielen exclaimed that the design and atmosphere reminded her of the Ryman Theatre (better known as the Grand Ole Opry to some) but heaped more praise on us as she said she prefers the Massey Hall over it but whispered for us not to tell anyone that. The Toronto institution is world famous in its own right having been the home of live album recordings for Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie, Neil Young, Blue Rodeo and Matthew Good.

For the encore just the three singers in Johnson, Thielen and Russell came out to sing Library Magic from their latest release in an acoustic fashion. Afterwards the rest of the band rejoined the trio to play a fitting cover of Neil Young’s Only Love Can Break Your Heart where despite the fact that Thielen’s violin wasn’t picking up any sound she was a trooper and continued to sing. It is always enjoyable watching a band have fun because their energy is infectious and makes the rest of the crowd enjoy themselves even more. Between humble thank yous and sing alongs it was impossible not to have fun. The warm sound that Massey Hall can give bands just heightens everyone to a perfect level of pleasure.

About author

Music Editor at Live in Limbo and Host of Contra Zoom podcast. Dakota is a graduate of Humber College's Acting for Film and Television. He now specializes in knowing all random trivia. He writes about music, sports and film. Dakota's life goal is visit all baseball stadiums, he's at 7.