For photographers, the aperture is the part of the camera that controls what amount and lets in the light--
With The Head and The Heart, the Seattle folk rock band we’ve followed for fifteen years, who made a midtown Kansas City stop at the Uptown Theater in support of their sixth studio album, their aperture was fully open (both figuratively and literally), to let in the light of a joyous and well-received performance.
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The three-act bill got underway with a buzzing relative newcomer, Anna Graves, who hails from, and recently returned to her family’s rural farm in Webster, MN, south of our main Twin Cities stomping grounds. After notching time in LA and Nashville but not finding the success she was hoping for, a return to her roots proved some much-needed gravity for her to take stock again and musically express herself even more open and honestly.
She laid that truth down to the audience prefacing “Made to Love Someone” and expressed how thrilled she was to have her music featured on the recent hit rom-com streamer, “Nobody Wants This” before playing “Fly”, one of the songs that made the soundtrack.
She mentioned her love of birds before her most recent single, “Bluebird” and taught the audience the chorus, on her set-closing “Minnesota’s on My Mind”, a song we can directly relate to. With song placements in other media and a guest vocal on the recent Wilder Woods’ (aka Bear from needtobreathe) single, “Offering”, we haven’t heard the last of Graves by any means.
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For Athens, GA band Futurebirds, the road never ends, with 2024’s Easy Company album (out via Dualtone Records) being the most recent reason to get back out there and play live again, like they obviously enjoy doing.
The band has been around since 2008, releasing a first album in 2010 and their current lineup (aka v5.0) includes Brannen Miles, Carter King, Daniel Womack, Thomas Johnson, Kiffy Myers, Thomas Myers, and Spencer Thomas, who all give off the vibe that you’re at their backyard barbecue and they’re all just jamming amongst friends.
Not much was said between songs, preferring to work as much in as possible, but the guitarists were jumping about the stage, they sing about things like “Olive Garden daydreams” and you would have thought the whole evening was over, when Graves and half of The Head and The Heart all jumped on stage to gleefully sing along on “Wild Heart”, the penultimate song of their fun set.
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The Head and the Heart are back with their new twelve-track self-produced record, Aperture, released on May 9 via Verve Forecast and celebrated in KC with a 98-min performance. We’re longtime fans as mentioned, having seen them most recently in Minnesota last summer and before that, in Kansas City on a co-headlining tour out at Starlight.
But our history goes even further back- with an initial in-store appearance at Electric Fetus on their first tour outside of the Pacific Northwest, a free University of MN concert to celebrate the end of the school year, and an appearance at the late, lamented Festival Palomino, put on by Trampled by Turtles.
Since all that, the band has musically evolved, as has their stagelight show, into something we hadn’t seen from this seemingly ‘simple folk band’ before. Things got off to a positive start with the initial single from the new album, “Arrow” with singer Jonathan Russell lyrically declaring, “I am my own arrow, I am my own home, it’s alright, it’s alright!”.
Their melodic harmonies are well known as well, with members (and husband/wife) Charity Rose Theilen and Matt Gervais joining in for “Cats and Dogs/Coeur d’ Alene”, which also found the restless Gervais jumping down into the front pit to shake hands and pose for cellphone pictures, all without missing a verse.
“All We Ever Knew” found the crowd singing back loudly and Gervais noted how grateful the band was to see so many singing along with the newer songs as well, though the new album has only been out about a month.
“After the Setting Sun” and “Honeybee” were nice to hear back-to-back, as both feature Thielen’s raspy pixie vocals and it has to be mentioned how much the band has raised its stage lighting game.
A long row of footlights and another behind the stage, along with horizontal light bars above the band, in addition to all the framing Vari-Lites, all made for an impressive visual spectacle that grew more illuminated as the set progressed. By near the end, synchronized lights were flashing everywhere, like something from a EDM concert, not a Seattle folk five-piece, and we came away very impressed.
After the new “Pool Break” (a special track for bassist Chris Zasche because it was the first composed for the new record and came together quickly), the members left the stage except for Russell, who, bathed under stark amber spotlights, mentioning they were just in Oklahoma City and he began the first verse of The Flaming Lips’ “Waiting for Superman” before abandoning it all together, never gaining its rhythm.
The full band returned, going into the emotional new “Cop Car”, followed by hits “Missed Connection” and “Virginia (Wind in the Night)” with Gervais back in the audience, first circling the crowd from the edges, then continuing in to sing from the center as cellphone lights and cameras flashed.
2013’s “Shake” and their typical set closer, “Down in the Valley” ended things on a high note, with the crowd left clapping and stomping for more. The encore began with the title track from the new record and Russell singing the question, “Come alive, come alive, what does it feel like?”
A late (but very welcome) addition scribbled in on some setlists was the swaying title track to 2013’s “Let’s Be Still” (whose bobbing piano chords sound like a vintage Brian Wilson song) and their breakthrough hit, “Lost in My Mind” provided one last sing-along. The sullen “Rivers and Roads” from their debut album, is both ethereal and sounds like an Irish farewell song, so was an ideal closer for the evening.
The aperture was fully open for The Head and the Heart on this night, both in taking in their stunning new light show and hearing the new songs, about hope, resilience, and encouraging a renewed clarity in seeing things, letting the light come in.
(click on any image to enlarge and to see in full)
THE HEAD AND THE HEART at Uptown Theater, Kansas City MO (2025-06-18)
THE HEAD AND THE HEART at Uptown Theater, Kansas City MO (2025-06-18)
THE HEAD AND THE HEART at Uptown Theater, Kansas City MO (2025-06-18)
FUTUREBIRDS at Uptown Theater, Kansas City MO (2025-06-18)
ANNA GRAVES at Uptown Theater, Kansas City MO (2025-06-18)
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