These rock goddesses refuse to mellow or slow down one bit

Heart’s Ann and Nancy Wilson are on a tour bus somewhere outside Salt Lake City, heading for yet another concert on yet another stage. The duo expects to complete 55 dates this year; last year, they did 90—two a week, nearly every week. So much for taking it easy after 35 years in the business and 35 million albums sold.

Rockers are supposed to mellow with age, but Ann, 62, and Nancy, 58, have rarely done what they’re supposed to do. No Great American Songbook for the sisters who set millions of heads banging with “Crazy on You,” “Barracuda,” “These Dreams” and “Magic Man.” “Any time anyone says ‘jazz standards,’ it makes my butt tingle,” says Ann. “Do that, and your rocking days are over.”  “We wanted people to know we’re not getting ready to take a dirt nap,” says Nancy.  “We’re still trying to save the world, one song at a time.”

More tough than tender, their new album Fanatic compares comfortably to anything on Little Queen or Dreamboat Annie. Ann wrote most of the songs on the tour bus. Not on tour—just on the bus. While everyone else took a short break, she motored from L.A. to Cincinnati and back. “It was like being in a moving artist garret,” she says. “There was nothing to do but write.” The 10-song CD was recorded mainly in motel rooms up and down the West Coast. The sisters also recently penned their memoir Kicking & Dreaming, A Story of Heart, Soul and Rock & Roll.

Click here to read the interview with Ann and Nancy.