[review 2005: the disappointments]

Gemma Hayes is relatively new to me. I haven’t waited two years for this album; Hayes’s career, in effect, has been compressed into the past month and a half. Whether this makes me more or less able to comment, I don’t know, but that’s never stopped me before.

Having heard both the UK and the US versions of Night On My Side as well as The Roads Don’t Love You (which is import-only at the moment), I’ve been able to formulate a theory. The original mix of Night On My Side was the first version I heard, and so perhaps I’m biased towards it as my favourite. But the subsequent rejigging of the album for the American market—despite being directed by Hayes herself—didn’t improve it at all. While she admits she kept “Over and Over” on the UK release purely for sentimental reasons, it’s not a bad track. And why “Day One” was left off entirely, and “What A Day” relegated to a hidden track, I don’t know. Then there’s the re-recorded versions of “Hanging Around,” “Back Of My Hand” and “Let A Good Thing Go.” The changes were slight—added backing vocals here, a different outro there—but it all pointed to someone tweaking the album for a larger audience. Finally, there was the news that Hayes had recorded The Roads Don’t Love You in Los Angeles (!) with a new set of studio musicians (!!) led by drummer Joey Waronker of R.E.M., Smashing Pumpkins and Beck fame. Gemma Hayes does Hollywood? I feared the worse.

Upon first listen, it sounds as though the worst has indeed come to pass. The sound is brighter, Hayes has changed her singing style to include a bit more Michelle Branch, and the grit from Night On My Side is gone. This isn’t a Gemma Hayes album so much as a Singer-Songwriter album that just happens to have Gemma Hayes playing the role of the chanteuse. The low-key brilliance of Hayes’s first album has given way to the melodramatic stylings of “Something In My Way,” a track that’s almost painful to listen to. This is the woman who wrote “Ran For Miles” and “Lucky One”?

The album does improve the more you listen to it. The first quarter of the album is easily the best, carving out a somewhat anonymous but pleasantly sparkly sound. “Happy Sad” seems to leave a trail of stardust in its wake, especially during the extended outro. But it all still pales in comparison to the pristine, untouched wonder of Night On My Side. Hayes mentioned in an interview that she’d had trouble writing songs after touring in support of her first album, and was afraid that she was finished with music. Only when Hayes had given up hope did she suddenly find she had another set of songs in her after all.

Little did she realize those songs were planted in her head by the devil. Hayes is far from the treacly theatrics of a Michelle Branch or Chantal Kreviazuk. But if she doesn’t watch herself, she may one day find herself stranded in L.A. with a guitar and a set of forgettable albums, trying to remember what it was that made her so special in the first place.