Recently, it seems like folk music and its similar styles are on the rise! The singer Noah Kahan hit the Billboard Hot 100 chart with his new folk-pop song “Stick Season”, which comes from an album of the same name with equally heartbreaking music, made by the already well-established-on-the-indie-scene singer Mitski. She released her indie-folk song “My Love Mine All Mine” and landed on the Billboard charts for the first time in her 12-year career. Also, the indie and folk-rock supergroup Boygenius (composed of indie-folk singers Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker) achieved 6 Grammy nominations and 3 Grammy Awards. So, it’s not hard to say that folk and all of its subgenres are all in and plan to stay on our radars for a while.
It’s not like folk is new, it has been known for decades. However, it has sparked more attention since the 2010s, with an emphasis on the 2020s. For example, some popular songs from the 2010’s are from this genre such as “Take Me to Church” by Hozier, but the cases of this type of music becoming THAT popular at the time of their release are far and few. Then again, some folk songs from the previous decade have gained some more traction in more recent years because of this new wave. TikTok picked up the song “Ophelia” by The Lumineers back in 2020 and the song “Soldier, Poet, King” by The Oh Hellos. This has had such an impact on the internet ever since the pandemic started: from “cottagecore” videos mentioning the whimsical rhythm, the song has from trends and quizzes deciding which of the three roles you should be.
I doubt that after listening to “Soldier, Poet, King” you went out of your way to check the duo– which is fair, as it is noticeable that mostly everyone did not do it: the song in question became widely popular, however, the band itself didn’t leave its place as an unknown music group– but I’ll prove you that getting to know them is worth your time.
BEGINNINGS
The Oh Hellos was born in 2011, back when siblings Tyler and Maggie Heath combined their musical talents to write their mother a birthday song (which you can listen to here!). Tyler was already an experienced musician, having released three albums as a solo act, and Maggie also had musical experience from growing up in a family that highly valued this kind of art. So, when they came together to write for their mother, the duo became inspired enough to start a group of their own. Remember the birthday song? It is made up of some sweet inside jokes from a family trip they had been to, which you can read more about in this 2018 interview to “Radio UTD”, including one very specific line. “Oh, hello”- does it sound familiar to you? That’s because it is that lyric that eventually inspired the band’s name!
Later in 2011, they released their first EP (Extended Play) also called The Oh Hellos, which included four songs and ended up with less than 15 minutes worth of songs. Despite being fairly short and their first official project together, all the songs are really emotional and worth a listen! The EP’s first song “Hello My Old Heart” has been featured in multiple shows ever since 2012, including Parenthood, 90210, Reign, and The Neighbors.
The experience of creating The Oh Hellos was quite positive for both of them, and they decided to collaborate again in 2012 to create their first full-length project: an album called Through the Deep, Dark Valley. The album was written, mixed, and produced fully by themselves and is composed of 11 songs, with themes that take after their upbringing, such as family roots and their vision of growth. The concept tells a story of someone who was born in sin, the prodigal son, and his journey to return to his origins, his family, his safe place and to redeem himself from his mistakes. The songs from this album range from energetic, youthful songs, such as “Second Child, Restless Child”, to more introspective and gloomy ones, like “Wishing Well”. Those are two songs that come up back-to-back and despite their different energies and rhythms, the Heaths were able to make the album flow very smoothly.
After the release of their 2012 disco, they decided that adding more people to their band would be beneficial. The siblings sought help from their friends, finally creating their current ensemble that accompanies them in shows and performances.
Another project came by in 2013 (despite being only released on Spotify a year later) that deeply connected them to their Christian roots again. It was a Christmas EP reimagining some classical songs, and for the first time, the full band (Maggie, Tyler, and the ensemble) got to perform together!
Something you might notice when listening to this and other projects made by the band is that many of their songs bring up biblical themes.That’s because the Christian church had a big part in their upbringing, according to a 2016 interview to “The Westword”.They didn’t want to label their songs as being religious since that would exclude a lot of people from being able to identify with their music. But they also still wanted to make their projects truly personal to them and include all of their experiences, from childhood to the present.
A NEW PHASE: DEAR WORMWOOD
I like to consider 2014 and 2015 an era of its own for the band. Although brief, it came with many achievements, more recognition, and a new album That’s when they started touring and participating in festivals, for example!
The 2015 album Dear Wormwood has 13 songs and they are full of biblical and intellectual references. It is also a concept album, as it tells the story of a victim’s letter about their abusive relationship and how they overcame it.
The title of the album itself, Dear Wormwood, is a reference to the book The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis. The book tells the story of an older demon (Screwtape) teaching a younger one (Wormwood) how to lure a human away from God through letters. The album reverses what is seen in the book by having the songs be heartfelt letters to those who took them astray in the first place, a “tormentee” sending letters to the tormenter. However, the siblings claim that while the songs are from the perspective of the human in this situation, it not follow thoroughly the book’s plot, and, as Maggie claims in an interview with Music Times in 2015, this album can be considered “fanfiction” more than anything.
The lyrical and artistic choices that the songs in this album have taken are well-thought and meaningful, with tracks that are upbeat in rhythm and heart-shattering in lyrics, bringing a beautiful contrast to the table. The song “Bitter Water” for example, – my favorite from the album – has the instruments lifting, but the lyrics are the opposite, showing the dependency the victim has on the abuser and how they are aware of the path that the relationship might trail to if no action is taken. Another deliberate artistic choice that they decided to keep coming in the following projects are the transition tracks, smaller songs that seamlessly blend one track to another, such as “In The Blue Hours Of Morning”, which connects “There Beneath” and “Exeunt”.
The storytelling aspects are also stunning, and the group was able to convey the journey of the victim escaping the abuser using instruments, rhythms, and lyrics. Each song represents a feeling, an action, or a phase in the protagonists´ life. We can notice that with “Exeunt” posing as their escape, “Soldier, Poet, King” the finding of a solution and proper peace, “Dear Worwood” showing the human facing their abuser and “Danse Macabre”, a cover of the original 1875 composition, showing the villain finally defeated. The story is magnificently told and if there is any of the Heaths’ albums that I’d recommend, Dear Wormwood would definitely be it.
To end off this era, the band decided to tour in 2016 while also taking back their Christian and Christmas songs origins, and with that, the 2016 tour “Christmas Extravaganza” came to life, which would eventually spark up new versions every so often!
THE FOUR WINDS SERIES TO THE PRESENT DAYS
From 2017 to 2020, the band released four albums representing each of the four Anemoi, wind spirits according to Greek mythology, and the passing of the seasons (which you can find out more about on their website. The project originally started as an idea for a solo series from Tyler, however, when it started to come together, Maggie joined in and helped to coin the direction the series was going.
According to the previously mentioned interview given to Radio UTD in 2018, the siblings thought that a concept as broad as “seasons” wasn’t going to fit them. So, they decided to change the album’s theme to the passing of seasons as a whole, the change that comes with the weather and the winds. Eventually, they settled on the wind deities as a good way to discuss said topic, because, as they claim themselves, they’re huge nerds! Given that connection, it is quite lovely to notice the different ways that literature, cultures, and beliefs have impacted their music in the long run, especially in these four albums.
The series starts with Notos representing summer, Eurus connecting with fall, Boreas being winter and Zephyrus ending it as spring, and following along with questions and ideas, As you’ll see, each album is composed of seven songs, of which two are instrumental transition songs.
Notos has some big thematic changes, as 2016-2017 in which the album was written and produced was contemporaneous to the American election period. At that time, Maggie and Tyler started to question their values as Texans and Christians in this world, given the political context of polarization of opinions, as shown in the 2018 article by the webmagazine America the Jesuit Review. Therefore, the album focused on their experiences with summer, the season represented but also showcased their own experiences with changing their minds, ideas and visions. It especially focuses on the question “Where did our ideas come from?” a theme explored in a delightful song called “Constellations” that showcases their reinvented style very well: the song is full of biblical references, while still being in a Greek mythology-inspired album and bringing in the proposed question fully into the lyricism. A personal highlight from this disco is the song “Planetarium Stickers On A Bedroom Ceiling”. The instrumental lead-in song to “Constellations” sounds like a softer, quieter version that just awaits to ask the full question of “What is even changing in me and my opinions?”, as if a child looked at stars before seeing the shapes in them. Those two songs are such a poetic duo!
The next installment in the series is Eurus, which is showcased as autumn and it shows what would be the next logical step by asking: for a bigger and more empathic understanding of the world around you or maybe a feeling of alienation from the place you had always felt safe within. The ties with fall start with the songs “Dry Branches” and “Grow”, the first which leads into the latter, as “Dry Branches” sounds just like falling rain. It resumes Through The Deep, Dark Valley’s “I Have Made Mistakes”’s idea of growth happening upon tragic and unlikely situations, but the autumnal sounds, connections and lyrics are present all throughout the album.
Following Eurus, fall, comes winter in the shape of Boreas, a cold, lonely winter, and thematically it reflects on the impact the change itself has had on you. How people can bend themselves over to avoid discomfort, to please others, etc. They ask winter to help them change into kinder and warmer people, despite how contradictory that sounds, and reflect how that may happen. This album’s highlights might as well be the pair of songs “Smoke Rising Like Lifted Hands” and “Boreas”, the former one being instrumental; “Boreas” showcases the hope that the change might lead to something better, sparking life and positive differences after all that questioning.
The last album Zephyrus is representative of spring and brings back the band’s uplifting sounds as a wave of hope and growth bathes the protagonist, showcasing evolution and the breaking of barriers of discomfort. This release ends the series beautifully, finishing the cycle and letting out hope for what is to come. Instead of a duo of songs for this album, I’ll have to say that its highlight is the song “Rounds” which has its first half act as an instrumental-only song before coming in with the pretty yet sober lyrics. It perfectly ends the cycle (starting with the name “Rounds” itself) pointing out how while this person may have figured themselves out, the cycle will go on for somebody else. And, this will happen after that other person’s cycle has ended and so on, showing how it is part of human nature to question and reconstruct their ideals, their lives, and their expectations.
After such beautiful songs, there’s truly not much I can say other than their most recent projects, such as a rerecording of Through The Deep, Dark Valley and a new Christmas album (The Oh Hellos’ Family Christmas Album: Volume II) that mixes covers, reimagination of already popular songs and their own music thrown in the mix. I have to say, it is quite a heartwarming album to listen to, especially seeing them sticking to their Christmas tradition at the end of every cycle!
Well, that was quite some history! I hope you enjoyed learning more about this band as much as I did and I truly wish that you will go check them out later, I promise you it’s worth it!
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The article above was edited by Lorena Lindenberg
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