Six-piece indie folk outlet Grand Canyon are a flashback in time, reflective of the folk rock and pop of the late 20th century this side of Tom Petty and Fleetwood Mac. Antithetical of the more synthetic nature of pop hits today, the band tends to hone their focus in on earthen hooks and infectious rhythms that would produce fitting anthems for any backroad. Grand Canyon isn’t just another quality indie outlet on the rise, though, having already proven their mettle through millions of album sales and multiple world tours underneath the belts of each of its members. With the recently released LP Le Grand Cañon, Grand Canyon proves their worth once again with a series of shimmering Americana-tinged pop expressions.
In particular, “Heaven” plays out as a vivid showcase of Grand Canyon’s 1970s-infused desert rock leanings. Running adjacent to contemporary bands like Escondido as, perhaps, their more pop-informed cousin, they shine as mournful vocals melt between a darkly ensemble of piano, guitar, bass, and drums. The music video for the tune is straight-shooting, featuring black-and-white shots of the band doing what they do best in-studio.
Lead singer Casey Shea tells PopMatters, “Anyone who’s heard the story about our first gig that ended in a gunfight knows that we left LA for a week to finish writing our first album. We found a place in North Fork, CA that was originally a stagecoach stop built in the late 1800s and set up shop for a week. Within the first hour of being there, we had four cell phones–all of the same make, all with the same carrier, all with the same internet connection–all reading different dates and times. It seemed we had found ourselves in the center of a strange space/time vortex. That night, we were explaining this phenomenon to some locals at a bar down the road, and they laughed and said, ‘Oh yeah, that place is definitely haunted.'”
“The next morning we began working on a new song based off a bass line that our guitarist Joe Guese had written. It may seem to be a pretty straightforward stalker song, but it came from the idea of this place being haunted and these spirits trapped in a different dimension trying to communicate with us from the great beyond–’Ahhh oooooh!'”