Philline: How Two Porcelain Kittens Mended Phil Headway’s Life
Some records are born in the studio. Philline was born on a living room shelf, between two red porcelain kittens. When Phil Headway was a child, he spent weekends at his godmother Leia’s house. In the living room, two plaster cats looked out over the world from above. He wanted to touch them. She warned him: be careful, they’re fragile. And the more she asked for care, the more the child felt the urge to challenge what was fragile. He dropped them. Many times. And Leia, with infinite patience, picked up every shard from the floor and glued them back together. Glued them and started over, as if nothing had happened, but always with the marks showing.
Years later, on his birthday, Leia placed the relic in his hands. “Now it’s your turn to take care of them,” she said. Phil held the cats and felt fear. Fear of dropping them again. Fear of not having his godmother’s gift for putting the pieces back together. Fear of losing forever what was valuable for memory, not for price. That’s when he decided to make them immortal. Not in plaster, but in music.
The story of those cats starts before him. In the 80s, Leia joined a Secret Santa at the office. She bought an expensive pen as a gift. She got back two plaster kittens. She thought it was unfair, too cheap compared to what she’d given. But the one who gave them was a great family friend. She saw the cats and thought of Leia. It was a sincere gesture, of love. Years later, when Phil found out it was that friend — now a little star in the sky — who had given them to Leia, his eyes filled with tears. Suddenly those penny objects were worth millions. Not on the market. In the story. Because the energy of those who love doesn’t depreciate.
That’s where the philosophy of Philline lives. We’re all like those cats. We break. We gather the pieces. We glue ourselves back together. And we become unique in our scars. It’s the Japanese art of Kintsugi: instead of hiding the crack, it’s highlighted with gold. The flaw becomes beauty. The story becomes value. Embrace imperfection, honor what the object has lived. Show that a mark isn’t a defect. It’s life.
Philline brought Phil back to music after years dedicated to literature. The name merges Phil with “feline.” It’s a direct nod to the porcelain cats that connect him to childhood. But when it comes to the title track, he defines Philline as a character: the perfect woman, a metaphor for the perfect life so many young people dream of. “But every desire brings consequences. This song makes you think about those decisions,” he explains. And he goes further: “When I think about the album name, Philline also represents my feminine side, the intuitive side. It’s like a cat stretching in the middle of chaos.”
The record is a landmark because it was born from a tear. In 2022, Phil was living through brutal inner conflict. Being a musician and a writer in Brazil seemed impossible. On one side, family and the responsibility to provide and protect. On the other, the purpose of bringing hope through art. The two things didn’t fit. He felt torn in half. An artist breathes art all the time and can’t separate work from life. It was in a conversation with his wife Tutti that the crack turned to gold. She suggested he record a full album of original songs and release it on digital platforms. She would handle distribution herself, even though she’d never dealt with it before. Phil resisted. He made excuses. Until he realized he didn’t even believe them. He surrendered to the challenge. And Philline was born.
The opening track, “I Just Have Started to Live,” makes it clear right away: no matter how big the challenge, follow what makes your heart beat stronger. “Freedom of a Diamond in the Rough” comes right after to remind us that we’re unique and need to break free from family beliefs to fly like an eagle. “752” plants the seed of an epic journey he’s building with Tutti, a fantasy trilogy that promises to change how people see the world. “The Joker is Me” also drops light brushstrokes of that story, still unrevealed, with modern folk, fingerpicked guitar, banjo replies and a chorus that sticks.
The album doesn’t ask permission from genres. It follows the heart. “She Has to Get into Town” is blues and jazz with a bridge that smells like the 60s, Beach Boys style. “Philline” calls us into a world of lust, but the gospel choir in the chorus pulls us back and asks where the real gold is. “We Demand Oceans” is Bob Dylan filtered through the present: a heavy chorus, sax solos, backing vocals screaming, and a sudden shift into jazz. “Magic Eyes” breathes Beatles, mixing country, jazz and blues, throwing layers of experimental rock and subliminal reverse messages. “Soul Fluids” keeps the line with piano marking time, voices completing each other and a trumpet solo that shines. It’s so much a part of this universe that Andy and Sarah quote the song in the book Beyond the Secret Land, played by the character Conlan Buckley. “Skiffle is My Name” is everything at once: bluegrass, jazz, mambo, rock, blues. It walks through many worlds and declares that Phil is all of them. It closes with “Your Fellas,” a Christmas song in the format of an Irish pub. Phil imagined lonely people meeting on a cold December day, trading solitude for community.
Released on November 11, 2023, with eleven tracks, Philline arrived in the month Phil and Tutti also celebrated their 11th anniversary. The record opened doors, brought fans from around the world and left a clear message: that return wasn’t an ending. It was the start of a creative whirlwind. Like porcelain cats mended with gold, Philline proves that it’s precisely the breaks that make us unique. We shine because of them.