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Album Review
by SashaS
26-5-2002
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| Gemma Hayes's 'Night On My Side' |
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Gemma Hayes: 'Night On My Side'
(Source)
Gemma Hayes takes a precarious path in the polymer world
It wouldn’t be much of a surprise if Danes suddenly claimed that they invented boy- and girl-groups. They are people who patented the toddler’s building-bricks after all, which is way most of the today’s top attractions are assembled. Not that ‘Duplo-pop’ has anything to do with Gemma Hayes, y’dig, just thought it worth mentioning…
She has neither much in common with ‘Oops, boobs-up!’ brigade nor with the ‘Alanis-school-of-cloning’. Gemma Hayes, the 24-year-old native of Tipperary, has produced one of the most impressive debut albums in ‘Night On My Side’ that displays her ability to move between genres and ‘languages’, Irish lilt, Texan twang and wholesome balladeer-ing, with ease of a well-seasoned musician. Her lyrical concerns are ashes of extinguished affairs and open-heart surgery on that love thang.
Hayes uses the trad-settings to embark upon 3-minute adventures: cosy confines of any styles are suddenly transformed with discordant breaks, arrangements floating between (mal)treated guitars and ambient touches, distortion-pedal and noise-outbreaks face off soulful, intimate and confessional songwriting tradition... Beauty of her music is a setting each song brings, taking you post-rock and beyond alt.country and folk. Still, there is very little sepulchral here, it is intense, insightful, profound and stylish. Imagine Beth Orton fronting Sonic Youth…
It is easy to believe that her cited influence is My Bloody Valentine, the 1980’s combo lead by Kevin Shields, that used to counter beautiful melodies with jolts of a rock-out and effects, classic pop world seamlessly welded with noise overload. ‘The Night’ is perfectly sequenced album, it starts gently with a tad of fuzz guitars but by the time it gets to cut No. 5, ‘Let A Good Thing Go’, it is all systems full-on with power chording. It follows the lazily spellbinding ‘Over & Over’ that is so lusciously orchestrated to make one fancy online porn.
Meandering-with-intent between straight-songwriting and engorged songs, it all peaks with the last trio of tracks to really show the true quality of this novice. ‘Lucky One (Bird of Cassadaga)’ is equally ethereal and aggressive, like The Breeders on a relaxed day. ‘My God’ is minimalistic with vocal so close to a mike to create an illusion of ‘hearing-voices’. The title song brings the parade to the glorious end with such sketchy accompaniment that you have to fill in the spaces, a process that produces a heady feeling.
Gemma Hayes’s disc is not only a fantastic debut but a near-masterpiece.
8/10
SashaS
26-5-2002
Gemma Hayes’s album ‘Night On My Side’ is released 27 May 2002 on Source
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