After the seventh week, I asked again to do a video. It went to number one and I said, “Can we do a video now?” And they said no, they wanted to see how well it would continue to do on radio and stay at one. They preferred to see how it would do on radio first. We wanted to do a video, but the label did not want to. I was adamant about that being the first release, which it was. The intro and the riff grabs your attention, and with the transition going on within rock music, there really wasn’t much that had a heavy riff intro. How did that make you feel? Were you surprised, or did you known people would gravitate towards it? You then put the song out for the world to hear and the reaction is incredible. It’s a great question in context of the record, something I never thought about, but “Heavy” for me, was certainly unlike anything else in terms of meaning. There was a song in there that I wrote about missing my wife, it was all about needs, there was a love song too. How did “Heavy” fit into Dosage thematically? Was it in tune with how you were feeling collectively or was it more of a unique spot within the record?
We’ll add some space to it and make it like an intro.” That’s what we ended up doing, aiming for this call to arms feel. I paused at a particular sound, and said, “Wait a second, what was that? Let’s loop that. I was doing edits, listening to the bridge of the song actually, and making sure the timing was right. The guitar intro is sonically so unique and captivating. I had this true sense of, not so much anger, but confusion. I really wanted a less than three-minute song where I get in and get out. At the time, rock music started moving away from riffs. It was recorded exactly the way I wanted to hear it. With what “Heavy” meant to you personally, what was your initial reaction after recording it and hearing it back for the first time? It’s such an honest subject matter and something everybody goes through in some way. So, the lyrics are exactly what I felt at that time. It felt like every emotion of a friend or particular relative was coming down on me. I had a desire to write about what I was feeling. It was an interesting combination of challenging myself lyrically and the emotions of what I was going through. When I came up with “All of your weight falls on me,” I thought that was perfect, I can now call the song “Heavy”. Everyone was throwing their problems on me, and I just felt like I was getting beat up a lot. I had to incorporate that with what I was going through at the time, which was very overwhelming. I wanted to write a song that didn’t have the title in the lyrics. I came up with the riff, played it for the boys, and they loved it. We started the Dosage record in Miami at what was once called Criteria Studios, it’s called The Hit Factory Sound now after The Hit Factory in New York. What do you remember about writing “Heavy”? Where was it written?
Here, Roland takes us inside the song - everything from when it was written, to why, to what it means to him now.
I recently spoke Collective Soul frontman Ed Roland, about “Heavy”. It’s a song that understands, and one that contains the inexplicable magic of music, where you feel better thanks its companionship. “And all your weight, it falls on me, it brings me down,” - a powerful line and feeling that everyone can relate to. With a running time of two minutes and fifty-five seconds, “Heavy” is a simple song with a mesmerizing guitar intro, but what makes it most attractive is how honest the lyrics are. “Heavy” as a single, served the band’s seventh number one song on Billboard’s Hot Mainstream Rock Tracks, making it their most successful song to date. It’s also the opening track on their brand new (and first) live record, Collective Soul Live. “Heavy” by Collective Soul, was the first single off the band’s fourth record, Dosage. Behind the hit song: with Collective Soul frontman, Ed Roland
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