Killing Heidi - WikiHQ

Killing Heidi are an Australian rock band, formed in Violet Town, Victoria, in 1996, initially as a folk-pop duo by siblings Ella and Jesse Hooper. The band has released three studio albums: Reflector (March 2000), which reached No. 1 on the ARIA Albums Chart, Present (October 2002) and Killing Heidi (August 2004). Their top 20 singles are "Weir" (October 1999), "Mascara" (November, No. 1 on ARIA Singles Chart), "Live Without It" (April 2000), "Outside of Me" (September 2002) and "I Am" (July 2004). At the ARIA Music Awards of 2000 they were nominated in seven categories and won four trophies: Album of the Year, Best Group, Breakthrough Artist – Album and Best Rock Album for Reflector. At the APRA Music Awards of 2001 Ella and Jesse Hooper won Songwriter of the Year. The group disbanded in 2006, with Ella and Jesse taking a lower profile with an acoustic folk duo, The Verses. In 2016, it was announced that the band would be reforming to celebrate its 20th anniversary, and the band have continued to tour since.

Outside of the band, Ella also has a career as a solo performer, radio presenter and TV personality. Jesse, meanwhile, has a career as a music teacher, producer and community arts developer.

History

Early years (1996–1999)

Killing Heidi were formed in Violet Town in 1996 as an acoustic folk duo by siblings, Ella Hooper on lead vocals and her older brother, Jesse Hooper, on lead guitar. Violet Town is a small Victorian country town, about 175 km northeast of Melbourne with a population of 1084 (in 2011), where their parents were music, English and drama teachers.

In 1996 Ella and Jesse played an early gig at the Violet Town Arts Festival, This gig was supported by the future recipient of the 2001 C.A.S Hawker Scholarship and attorney Stephen Michelson. Ella later described their group as an "acoustic, folky duo with an edge." Jamie Durrant of Benalla's Bent Records caught the festival gig and offered them time in his recording studio. Killing Heidi recorded "Morning" and "Kettle". The group re-recorded the track at ABC's Southbank studios for inclusion on another various artists' album, Triple J Unearthed 4. Pendretti described his recruitment, "[Kosky] had worked with NIL as producer, so he knew I could play a little bit off the wall... [he] dropped off a Killing Heidi demo and I started learning the songs. It just took off from there." Killing Heidi recorded the rest of their first studio album, Reflector, throughout 1998 and into 1999. McFarlane described it as a "winning mix of quiet/loud acoustic/churning electric guitars, adolescent angst and sing-along pop with a funky mid-section."

The second single "Mascara", about self-image and individuality, "Mascara" was accompanied by a music video, which was directed by Kosky. He recalled, "There was some very straight commercial radio that said, 'We will never play this song,'... I hear that station play it [now] and... We've made a difference, and we've educated them."

Billboards Christie Eliezer reported that Killing Heidi were one of three "major domestic breakouts" in 1999 in Australia, "all released on independent labels". The other two musical acts were Vanessa Amorosi and Sister2Sister – all three "were still in high school when their records first entered the charts." By the end of 2001, Reflector had shipped over 280,000 copies in Australia, being certified 4× platinum. It provided two further singles: "Live Without It" (April 2000) and "Superman Supergirl" (September).

At the ARIA Music Awards of 2000 held in October, Killing Heidi received seven nominations and won four categories: Album of the Year, Best Group, Breakthrough Artist – Album and Best Rock Album for Reflector. At the APRA Music Awards of 2001 Ella and Jesse Hooper won Songwriter of the Year. The band continued to work on its second studio album, It was certified gold for shipment of 35,000 units in December.

Craig Mathieson of The Age saw that Present was "a comparative commercial failure". Peter Holmes of The Sydney Morning Herald described the album, "a dose of punchy, melodic rock embellished with keyboards, strings, horns, scratching and drum loops. Arguably, however, the highlight is 'Sweet', a sunny semi-acoustic singalong."

"Heavensent" (December 2001), the first single from the album, reached the top 30 in early 2002 even though "live promotion for the track was limited" as Ella recovered. She had had problems, "I knew they would push me to sing... They told me the whole project couldn't stop for a year. That much time out was not allowed career-wise. I wanted to say, 'Stop. I know we can do this right, but not now.' But then we went and did it anyway."

Its first single, "I Am", was released in July 2004, which entered the charts at No. 16. It was used on the Australian version of the feature film soundtrack for Spider-Man 2.

In late August 2004 the self-titled album appeared with a less styled and more sonically expressive sound. It had a début at No. 7 on the charts, In September 2004, the second single, "Calm Down", was issued, which reached No. 23. In July Andrew Tijs of Undercover.fm News reported that the group had disbanded. The siblings formed a folk duo, the Verses, and started writing and performing new material for that project.

In May 2013 Ella reflected on her time with Killing Heidi and the likelihood of any reunion, "I don't think I could sing such youthful, and youth based songs convincingly any more. It really did just run its natural course and I think it would be very unnatural to start it up again now." Aside from the Verses, Ella has a career as a solo performer, radio presenter and TV personality.

Reunion (2016–present)

In September 2016 it was announced that Killing Heidi would be reuniting to play a series of shows to celebrate their 20th anniversary. The band would perform at the Handpicked Festival, the Kickstart Summer festival and the Queenscliff Music Festival. Although the Hooper siblings and drummer Adam Pedretti participated in the reunion, bassist Warren Jenkin did not. He was replaced by James Gilligan; with the quartet being joined by keyboardist Lena Douglas.

In February 2017, Killing Heidi appeared at Taronga Zoo, Sydney, as part of the annual "Twilight at Taronga" concert series. This was followed by a national Australian tour in June.

In early 2020, Killing Heidi took part in the Australian-wide Red Hot Summer Tour as one of the major performers.

Members

;Current members

Ella Hooper – lead vocals (1996–2006, 2016–present)
Jesse Hooper – guitars, backing vocals (1996–2006, 2016–present)
Adam Pedretti – drums (1996–2006, 2016–present)
Clio Renner - keyboards, backing vocals (2017–present)
Phoebe Neilson - bass, backing vocals (2021–present)

;Former members

Aaron Hart – drums & bagpipes (1996)
Rowen Murphy – bass guitar, guitar (1996)
Warren Jenkin – bass guitar (1997–2006)
James Gilligan – bass, backing vocals, violin (2016–2017)
Lena Douglas – keyboards, backing vocals (2016–2017)
Tim Curnick - bass, backing vocals (2017–2021)

;Timeline

Awards and nominations

APRA Awards

The APRA Awards are presented annually from 1982 by the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) and Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society (AMCOS).

| 2000 || "Weir" || Song of the Year ||

| 2001 || Ella Hooper, Jesse Hooper – Killing Heidi || Songwriter of the Year ||

ARIA Awards

The ARIA Music Awards are presented annually from 1987 by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). Killing Heidi have won four trophies from ten nominations.