Q’s With Nancy Wilson: Trailblazing Shredder Talks First Solo Album, Eddie Van Halen, Being Banned In Ireland

Jeremy Danger – Nancy Wilson’s
first solo album, You and Me, drops May 7.

As a college girl, Nancy Wilson was drawn to the duality of rocking hard and the bucolic folk of Fairport Convention. Raised on the move, the seeming incongruities intrigued instead of repelled the lithe blonde; those incongruities would define Heart, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees who share Led Zeppelin’s same blues/rock/Joni Mitchell acoustic framing.

That acoustic guitar-filigreed, authoritative power-downstroke and sheer joy of playing marked Dreamboat Annie, Little Queen, Bébé le Strange, Dog & Butterfly and so many of Heart’s albums. It’s all over You and Me, Nancy Wilson’s first solo album. The downy voice that launched “These Dreams,” the band’s first No. 1 single, remains as soft and dusky as ever. Wilson’s positivity explores songs written with longtime friend/Heart collaborator Sue Ennis, plus an uplifting take on Springsteen’s “The Rising,” a quiet reckoning for Pearl Jam’s “Daughter” and Paul Simon’s “The Boxer” with Sammy Hagar.

A comfortable collection that tackles humanity, dignity, kindness, identity and compassion, You and Me is fluid, supple. Working from her well-established rock foundation, there are glimmers of power pop, grunge, bucolic folk and, well, Heart on the musician Wilson’s debut.

Pollstar: You were that first woman who came out and really had success, rocking with authority. At a time when hard rock or arena rock was “so male,” you brought femininity and shredding!

Nancy Wilson: I’ve always had a thing along the way you imprint and absorb. To me, less is more, and restraint is a revolutionary act. A lot of shredders are just trying to hit every note possible as fast as they can; that was never it for me.

Eddie Van Halen did that, but wasn’t showboating. It was always very intelligent, always major keys, always a grin. It was so much more than just a relentless pummeling of notes, it was happy.

Great playing is so much more than velocity.

The most memorable is where you get the story (from what’s played). The best guitarists deliver as much as the singer does with words.

And Heart really rocked without sacrificing womanliness.

In the beginning, when we were out thrashing, owning our leadership roles, we didn’t think about it. We were who we were, our band was an extension of that.

For me, it was more acoustic initially, but I was playing more like percussion. It was very aggressive and physical. I guess because we’re Marine Corps brats, we had this concept: “We are powerful.”

The whole feminine thing was such a surprise to us … (people surprised) that we could be so powerful up there with the big boys. We could pull it off, just be up there and be who we are. But it worked, we played with everyone.

But it wasn’t “Oh! Girls can rock.” You still ran into the disbelief, or double standards.

When Heart did “All I Want To Do,” we didn’t change the gender (in the song), and were banned in Ireland.

Really?

It’s a “wanton” woman who has sex with a hitchhiker. Then there’s this child out of wedlock. It was just too challenging. But why can’t a woman decide who she wants to make love to? Or have a child if she wants? Sexualizing and objectifying can be both ways, though I’m not sure that’s here. But, yes, we were banned in Ireland.

Richard McCaffrey / Michael Ochs Archive / Getty Images – Then & Now:
Nancy and Ann Wilson of Heart playing the Oakland Coliseum in Oakland, Calif., in 1977.

On You and Me, you do the same gender thing with Paul Simon’s “The Boxer.”

You don’t change the gender on a song like that! It’s way too iconic. It’s not standing in a woman’s shoes, it’s telling a story.

With Sammy Hagar, who no one would’ve expected.

I’ve done “The Boxer” my whole life, and I wanted to do it here. I’d called Sammy, sent him some songs. He said, “That’s way too expected. What else have you got?” I told him; he immediately responded, “I love that song!”

The surprise of this energy he brings to it, because of how he feels, it just lifts the song.

You’ve always collaborated, even beyond the band. You’ve got a song with Guns N’Roses’ Duff McKagan and Foo Fighters’ Taylor Hawkins called “Party at the Angel Ballroom” that sort of celebrates the people we’ve lost.

That’s something that spilled out of my mouth when we lost another of our rock angels, Petty, maybe. I wanted to create a very cinematic party, very “Dolce Vita” with that idea of, “Hey, it’s a party in heaven, so we can party like Hell…” You want to think of them celebrating up there, you know? Just a funny, whimsical idea with something pretty serious inside it.

I called Taylor, who I’d done “Don’t Look At Me That Way” with for his solo album, and asked if he had something for me. He sent this jam he’d had with Duff, and it was perfect.

“4 Edward” honors Eddie Van Halen.

I watched a bunch of Eddie on TV, took note of his writing style, the beaming, smiling major keys and energetic joyfulness, that effervescence like he was getting away with it. I wanted to capture that. He was always just grinning … I remember when he complimented me on my playing, it was, “WHAT?!”

“The Dragon” reaches back to grunge and Seattle.

I actually wrote that in Seattle in the early ‘90s for Layne Staley, while he was still alive. “The Dragon,” too, was about all that he was going through, pretty trippy, pretty off-balance to be sure.

All this music. What took you so long?

Obviously, there’s the Catch-22 of road life with Heart. You go a week, 10 days, home two, three days. You do your laundry, open the mail, do a little cooking and just enjoy sitting in your house. You know, I rest my hands, rest my voice.

But that’s a blessing inside the larger curse of this year: people were learning to work from home and having a better home life. So, I felt lucky to have the time, even though the circumstances weren’t what anybody wanted.

And in Northern California, I actually have a music space where I can leave all the amps and guitars out and set up. I don’t have to worry if my racket is disturbing everyone else. I’ve been asked about this for years, always saying, “I’m gonna do it.”

And now You and Me, which pairs you and Sue Ennis on the title track.

I had a dream about my mom. I got to see my mom, to talk to her and hang around. I think through our DNA, we’re connected – and it just lifted me up. I felt reassured, her telling me, “Everything’s going to be OK.”

When I called Sue, who I’ve known since I was in college, she had her version of a song like this, too. Hers was “Follow Me,” mine was “You and Me and Gravity.” So, we put them together, because we all need that reassurance right now. The word “gravity” kind of ungrounds it, takes it to the sky and makes it feel like what it was…

With touring starting to start up, any chance some of this will be heard?

Right now, on July 9, we have a show planned in Seattle. All my players live there, so we’re going to do these songs and some Heart songs with the symphony at Benaroya Hall. They have a big pipe organ, so, yes, a symphony show live! The audience was distanced as they need to be.

And 2022, there are some big offers on the table, so we’ll be out there soon.