Another major No.1-country act is coming to the Battlefords and to Gold Eagle Casino at the end of the month.
Restless Heart, the ‘90s gold-album group with hits including I’ll Still Be Loving You, When She Cries and The Bluest Eyes in Texas, will be performing April 30 at 8 p.m. at Gold Ridge Center. Doors open 7 p.m.
The group, whose roots date back to 1984, consists of John Dittrich, Paul Gregg, Dave Innis, Larry Stewart and Greg Jennings. It was Jennings, lead guitarist for the group, who spoke to the News-Optimist about their tour to the Battlefords.
“Touring is the thing we do most, and spring and summer is our busy time,” said Jennings.
When Jennings spoke to the News-Optimist, his band was in Atlanta getting ready for a performance in that area. That was followed up with a performance in the Virginia Beach area, and then some downtime in Nashville before heading to Sherwood Park, Alta. and finally the Battlefords at the end of the month. After that, the tour heads to Regina and to Fort Yates, N.D.
As for work in the recording studio, “last year we released our first Christmas album,” Jennings said, and “we’re working on some new stuff now, but that’s sort of in the works.” The Christmas album coincided with the band’s 30th anniversary.
The group got started in Nashville with members having come from around the United States.
“From there we enjoyed each other’s company and enjoyed the fact that we had the chemistry and the vocals, and decided to pursue it and with a good team of people around us who got us some great songs and promotion and we’re still fortunate to do it 30 years later.”
The band is distinctive for having a country-rock or country-pop sound, and the band members cite a number of different musical influences including ones outside of traditional country music.
Their musical style was cutting edge for their time, long before the crossover-sound became common for performers out of Nashville.
“We came out in the ‘80s, the era of the new traditionalists, and we were sort of the progressive kids on the block at that time,” said Jennings.
“Of course it’s gone way beyond that now. Country music has grown so much in being a lot more inclusive and tolerant of people bringing in a lot of different influences.”
Their career in music has gone beyond the band’s wildest dreams, including six consecutive No. 1 hits and four gold albums.
“We had a great run in the ‘80s and ‘90s, and we still seem to have an audience out there. We had an audience of original fans and now their children come to shows and say ‘you know, my parents used to play your records when I was growing up. I used to go to sleep to your songs, now we’re big fans and we tell all our friends.’ So it’s like a new generation is coming up to see Restless Heart also.”
Part of the reason fans are rediscovering Restless Heart is because after that initial period of hits in the early ‘90s, the band went their separate ways for a number of years.
“But then we realized how special it was and how we were better together as five than we were separately,” said Jennings.
“We decided to get back together and see if there was still an audience out there, and luckily enough there was.”
The audience in the Battlefords can expect to hear many of the hits that have been a hallmark of Restless Heart over the last number of decades.
“We’ve been around for 30 plus years and we’ve got quite a catalog of songs that we’ve recorded and released,” said Jennings.
“So they’ll be hearing all the hits that we’ve had plus some things that they can only be able to see in a live show. It’ll be a good time, and we hope a lot of people will come out and see us. We’ll come out and say hello to everybody after the show’s over, so looking forward to meeting and seeing a lot of people.”
