Most of the US is experiencing a heatwave now, and San Francisco is no exception. New York City is not only sweltering, but part of Queens is without power too. All these factors make me think of an old favorite album, Heart's Little Queen. Why? Well, I was living in New York City on July 13, 1977, when the entire city lost power during a heatwave. And the moment things went dark and silent that night, this very LP was playing -- loud -- on my turntable. I was listening to Kick It Out -- the last track on side one, and as the analog turntable gradually slowed its 33 1/3 revolutions per minute to no revolution at all, this little rocker gracefully wound down: Kick out your motor and drive, while you're stiiilllll aaallliiiiivvvveeeee ... kiiiiiiiiiccckkkkk ittttttttt oooooooooouuuuuuuuuuttttttt t t t t t . . . 
This album, new at the time, was in high rotation in the Summer of '77. Ann and Nancy Wilson (who are, esentially, Heart) rock hard and also deliver gentle acoustic folk sounds on Little Queen -- like a female version of Led Zeppelin. "Barracuda" was the big hit single, but the majestic "Love Alive" is my favorite. The Gypsy/Renaissance-style clothes, props, and settings on the front and back covers add a certain Tolkien-forest fantasy feel to the whole album. Heart burst on the scene with the outstanding debut Dreamboat Annie the year before, but reached the apex of cool with Little Queen. As a sixteen year old boy then and even now, as I listen to the music and gaze at the album, how could I not bestow all my reverence to them?We -- all eight million of us -- survived the blackout. No one had air conditioning, but we had candles and flashlights and battery-powered transistor radios were plentiful. Ironically, ice cream and frozen food were abundant: instead of letting the contents of freezers spoil, everybody consumed all they could and shared the excess.
When the lights came back on late the following night, the needle went right back on side one, track five of Little Queen.
9 comments:
ah yes i remember heart from the 80's...my twin brother was quite in to them...i how ever was to busy being a punk at that time..or was it new romantic..er its all a bit of a blank now...lol...
god damn I love me some heart
Hi there,
I didn't see any surfers in the Englischer Garten in Munich, but a lot of spontaneous swimmers- it was been equally hot in Europe this summer. Although we are used to this is Toronto, it seems quite extreme for the Germans.
I remember the 77 blackout in NYC, and I was always a great fan of Heart. Dreamboat Annie was my favourite of mine, but I also have a soft spot for Dog & Butterfly. I wanted to be Ann Wilson in 1977.
Cheers,
AM
Nice memory! That was the lovely thing about vinyl wasn't it. If the power stopped, the needle just stayed in the same place ready to wind up again! Funnily enough, Heart escaped me, but then being a Brit, I was almost totally into Brit music at the time..you know, the Who, Zep, Caravan etc.
After that, I went to South Africa where music was limited to sanction busters, so SA music dominated for me, so as I said, Heart?...
Gypsy ~ Heart did have a "comeback" in the mid-'80s, and while "These Dreams," "Never," and "What About Love" are great songs, there is a taint of calculated overproduction that, for me, makes the '70s Heart the best!
Roxi ~ Me love Heart too!
Anne-Marie ~ Seems like it's hot everywhere, not just in the US! This makes An Inconvenient Truth all the more relevant. We live on different continents, but we all share the same planet.
I like Dog & Butterfly too, which was released the year after Little Queen. You wanted to BE Ann Wilson? I wanted to DATE Ann Wilson in the '70s!
VallyP ~ I still have a turntable, and I can recreate this fade-out by just pulling the plug. Analog still has its charms!
It's not too late to discover Heart. Little Queen is now available on a remastered CD!
I like Heart too.
I still have all my old albums, my mom's as well, my 45's, my turntable (received on my 16th. B-Day, replaced the belt once), my 8 track with tapes, my reel to reel and tapes, my cassette deck and tapes.
Most people call their computers their towers my sterio is my tower of power.
Sorry, was this TMI?
I so do love reading your oh-so-information-packed-in-such-a-sassy-and-unforgettable-manner-posts! Hearting Heart is a must!
1977? *sigh* I was 2 then! Dios mio!
That is a great album and one, for some unknown reason, I no longer have in my vinyl collection. I'll have to remedy that.
It's cool that someone else still enjoys vinyl. It does indeed have it's charms. So much so that some of us analog nuts will go out and smack sixteen hundred down on a VPI Scout.
I did like the line" he's a magic man, mama", but in late '77, I was listening to the Jam(thank you BBC overnight, aired by some Boston Station) and a bunch of funk records that were my moms.
Currently jammin out to peaches new lp, Impeach My Bush". Effin hardcore.....
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