Heart On Aftermath Of Family Assault: "We Just Need to Talk to Each Other"
By Annie Reuter
(RADIO.COM) – While Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart are currently on hiatus, the sisters insist that the band has not broken up. In an interview with Rolling Stone, both sisters tell their side of the story after Ann's husband was accused of assault following a performance on August 26, 2016, at Auburn, Washington's White River Amphitheatre.
As Heart was singing their last song of the evening, backstage Nancy's 16-year-old twin sons asked their uncle, Dean Wetter, to see Ann's new tour bus. While Wetter brought the teens on the bus he told them to keep the door closed so the dogs on the bus wouldn't escape. As they left the bus, one of the teens left the door open for his brother which enraged Wetter. Wetter then allegedly hit one teen and then grabbed the other by the throat when he tried to intervene.
Wetter was later arrested and charged with two counts of assault, one felony and one misdemeanor. The altercation has left both sisters estranged and in separate interviews with the publication, they remain optimistic about Heart's future.
"I do see a positive way forward and that's our friendship," Ann says. "Nancy and I didn't do this thing. We are each other's friends and have been and will after this. Right now, we're supporting each of our families. Nobody in this situation is evil. We have to be like trees that grow around the little imperfections."
Meanwhile, Nancy admits that the "victory lap I was hoping to have this summer" is on hold until "feelings all settle down and people can just be adults and talk to each other."
"If [Dean] makes [Ann] happy, then I'm really glad for her," she says. "Everyone makes mistakes. It's been freaky and more negative than it needed to be, but I'm willing and ready to humanize it all and get back into a dialogue, with Ann in particular, about if we've still got Heart. I feel pretty positive that we do, but it's been impossible to know that for a long time now.
"It's so unnecessarily competitive and those are the kind of destructive behaviors that harm big, positive relationships like me and Ann's," she adds. "I just know in my gut that me and Ann are going to be fine. We love each other and we've weathered all kinds of stuff in the past together no one would ever imagine and this is just one of those things. We just don't need the high school drama swirling around the camp. We just need to talk to each other."
Ann Wilson performs at the Alameda County Fair on Thursday, June 29th.
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