The Band of Heathens' Ed Jurdi has long lovedThe Beatles.
“I remember dancing around in the living room to theirMagical Mystery Tourrecord on the turntable,” Jurdi, 46, tells PEOPLE in a recent interview. “I would be sitting there with my parents and my dad would point out the sounds of the bass guitar and the vocals.”
The Band of Heathens' Gordy Quist also holds memories of the legendary quartet tightly in his grasp these days.
“The Beatles are a return to home in a way,” interjects Jurdi. “They’re like the sun. If you play the kind of music we play, it’s something you need to know about and be educated about, you know?”
Band of Heathens.ALYSSE GAFKJEN
However, just a few years back, that group was tired.
“Our life has been this adventure of rock and roll touring nonstop in a million different cities all the time,” says Quist. “[The pandemic] was our first time really getting to really experience what to others might be mundane.”
“The pandemic gave us this ability to be home and refocus on the family,” adds Jurdi. “We could focus on these little things that we had missed since we had been kind of racing through our entire adult life thus far.”
One of those ‘little things’ was the love of the family around them. And it’s this love, in its purest form, that finds its way into The Band of Heathens' new song “All That Remains,” a trippy yet romantic take on the somewhat complicated adoration that makes life so very beautiful.
Centering on the ideals that got the sentimental rockers here in the first place is something that has certainly directed the recording of their new albumSimple Things, which is set for release on March 17.
Indeed, the record also helped The Band of Heathens mentally recalibrate.
“I kind of felt as if we were revisiting our younger selves in the band again,” Jurdi remarks. “Just finding that energy and that excitement again was something extraordinary. It would’ve been a different record certainly if that had not happened.”
“I feel like I’m standing at the top of the hill,” adds Quist quietly. “On one side, I can see my childhood and my parents, at a time when I had no idea of the sacrifices they were making. And then, on the other side of the mountain, I see my parents getting older now and see myself approaching that. It’s the circle of life I guess.”
source: people.com
