by Lauren Rosier
photos by Piper Ferguson
In the early to mid 2000s, Jason Heath formed a band that would lead to his current Jason Heath and the Greedy Souls. The music was much mellower and acoustic; he began asking friends to play with him, such as Wayne Kramer, and the music progressed into something completely different.
“As we started playing the new material live, the other band fizzled out, and became Jason Heath & the Greedy Souls. The only other person that stuck around is Jason Federici,” Heath explains about the early days of the band.
Heath and the band just released their first album, A Season Undone, on Kramer’s Industrial Amusement label earlier this year.
“The music business is so competitive. The Americana genre is a big deal now,” he says. “[With this record], we tried to go towards a more blues, garage rock, ’60s R&B.”
The title track of the record is one of specific importance and inspiration as the title of the song reveals. “It’s about that process, and I think a lot of the songs reflect that. Several times in your life, you’re faced with a deconstruction with everything in your life up until that point. In order to move forward, you have to destroy everything in the past. You know that you can’t use anything you have with you, you just fall. After the hurricane passes, they’ll be room to build again,” Heath explains.
That song and many of the other songs on A Season Undone were inspired by some personal issues that he was dealing with at the time. “A lot of the songs were written during that process for me. I was wrestling with demons of addiction and financial ruin. I literally broke down to nothing and I wouldn’t change it for anything.”
That’s where the truth and the live show come in – the band’s live show is anything but dull. You’re going to get what you paid for in a high-energy live show similar to the likes of Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers and the E Street Band.
“We give the same level of intensity every night no matter how many people in the audience,” Heath promises.
Heath and the Greedy Souls are slated to rock out Ortlieb’s on Thursday. Be prepared for a banger. “Expect 110% of honest, just, rock and roll with a dash of tenderness,” he says. He wants concertgoers and fans to come away with one thing after attending one of the band’s shows: “Music is valuable and connections are healthy. We’re all in this together.”
