The Shandies are Natalie and Shannon Stein, a married couple who created the album “First Born.” The album was inspired by their shared experience of being firstborn daughters.
“As we're kind of moving into middle age and just thinking about the responsibilities that place in the family carries,” Natalie said. “The album kind of reflects thinking about those responsibilities, the ones that we have to carry, and then maybe the ones that we can let go of.”
The album cover also draws from this inspiration. Natalie and Shannon reached out to their friend, artist and musician Kerrie Szabo from National Park Radio, to bring their idea to life.
“We kind of had this idea of keys on a big key ring,” Natalie said. “It's supposed to represent just all the responsibilities of the firstborn. And Kerrie just took it even further.”
Multiple other musicians helped shape the album, including Dave Wilson, Jeff Smith, Les Gallier, Seth Darby and Oren Thornton.
Natalie and Shannon have been attending Folk Alliance events and workshops around the Midwest to build upon their work.
“I've been to a couple of really cool songwriting workshops in Nashville over the last year,” Natalie said. “One of them included some studio time at Ocean Way Studios in Nashville, and that's where I got to record one of the singles from this album, which is ‘Happier Without You.'”
Shannon explained how they share the process of creating music.
“We have a couple songs on there that we worked on together,” Shannon said. “Usually Natalie has the full song and then we come up with harmonies and arrangement and the guitar parts.”
“First Born” is available on all streaming platforms, and CDs are available for purchase at theshandies.com.
