“‘Walls’ is one of my favorite songs from my favorite Wildflowers / Echo / She’s the One era of Petty’s music. We first played the song live with our friend Robert Ellis on a Cayamo Cruise tribute to Tom Petty, shortly after his passing. Robert crushed it live, so we called him again during the pandemic to deliver the goods for the Remote Transmissions,”sharesguitarist-vocalist and founding member Gordy Quist. Listen now: Throughout the pandemic lockdown for 52 weeks, The Band of Heathens, hosted an online live show every Tuesday night. The five-piece group came together via Zoom from their respective homes—in California, Texas, Tennessee and North Carolina—for the Good Time Supper Club, a 90-minute variety program. The segment of the show, called Remote Transmissions, became a much-anticipated fan favorite each week. And it is now the title of a new album release (volume one of a planned series), featuring covers of 10 classic songs by artists including Margo Price, Todd Snider, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Nicki Bluhm, Hayes Carll and Charlie Starr. The Band of Heathen’s Remote Transmissions Vol. 1 is set to release Feb. 25, 2022. Quist shares, “Everyone was scared and uncertain about what was happening, so the show was like a release, where we all connected and forgot about the stuff going on around us. We couldn’t play music together in the same room, so it was like trading songs, having a drink segment, we were even reading Shakespeare—just doing totally ridiculous things. At some point, we decided to bring in guests for an interview, and that turned into ‘Hey, let’s pre-record a music video of a cover song with each of them.’” And thus Remote Transmissions Vol. 1 was born! Quist continues, “We didn’t try to reinvent the wheel. Normally, with covers, we would’ve looked for that certain twist to make the songs radically different from the originals. But we couldn’t really do that, because we weren’t in the same room. So the versions are pretty close to the original arrangements. There was a time crunch with producing a show every week. We didn’t even think about it becoming an album. But all the guests stepped up and did a great job. So it was really hard picking 10 songs for this record.” The Band of Heathens are an American rock ’n’ roll band from Austin, Texas. The band was originally formed by Ed Jurdi, Quist and Colin Brooks in 2005. In 2008 the band released their first, self-titled, studio album. Produced byRay Wylie Hubbard, and featuring notable guestsPatty Griffin, Stephen Bruton andGurf Morlix, the record went to #1 on theAmericana Music Association’s radio charts. In November 2008 the album was ranked eighth place on theAmericana Music Association’s Top 100 Albums of the Americana Charts for 2008. The band’s last release was 2020’s critically acclaimed album Stranger produced by GRAMMY Award winning producer, Tucker Martine. Pre-orders for Remote Transmissions, Vol. 1 are available now here. Next, do people who are tone-deaf hear music differently?
