After years of writing and recording roots and folk music, and often standing alone with an acoustic guitar at festivals and venues across Canada and abroad. Jeff Stuart has teamed with a group of versatile and talented collaborators...The Hearts; Gavin Dunn, Dwayne Martineau, Chris Quesnel, Sara Hart, and Tim Resaul. While each are unique and accomplished musicians individually, together they create an energy that reaches beyond the sum of their parts. With the release of their debut recording Black Dogs Blue Giants, Jeff Stuart and The Hearts are a bright light in the firmament of Canadian music.

"It's elegant, sophisticated, daring, and brilliantly creative, but more than anything, just as the band's name suggests, this music is indeed from the heart."

-CKUA Presents: Alberta Disc-overies, September, 2009-

~ ARTICLES & REVIEWS ~

"Alt-country might be the starting point for the Hearts, but only in an allusive way, almost as if they decided to reconstruct the genre after hearing about it rather than actually hearing it. They're baroque rather than barroom, enamoured of tricky musical arrangements and elliptical lyrics ( Wrong I Guess), shoegazers that sometimes like to stomp. Brian Wilson would appreciate the vocal harmonies, Charlie Rich would nod appreciatively at Stuart's existential weariness; call them what you will, I'm calling them for the year-end Top 10 list (4.5/5 stars)."

-Edmonton Journal, November, 2009-

"A general sense of rampant creativity lends these heartfelt, plaintive songs a dreamy, unpredictable quality that keeps the listener engaged from the disc's beginning to its end... the ambitious arrangements highlight Stuart's songwriting and vocal performances to great effect, burnishing the lustrous melodies with layer upon layer of musical dynamism. It's elegant, sophisticated, daring, and brilliantly creative, but more than anything, just as the band's name suggests, this music is indeed from the heart.

-CKUA Presents: Alberta Disc-overies, September, 2009-

"...basically tantric sex in a bottle. Stuart begins singing -his voice about a third of the way between The Jayhawks' Gary Louris and Wilco's Jeff Tweedy. As these warm, epic lyrics wash over you, what's going on in the background is even more amazing, a slow-moving merry-go-round where every new horse catches the light in its own unique way... Total win-win, taking the corpse of alt-country and turning it unrecognizably beautiful (5/5 stars)."

-See Magazine, September , 2009-