A reflective, maudlin, mixture of folk, analogue synth and old-school indie.
‘Blind Faith’ is Gemma Hayes’ first album in 10 years, following a hiatus to spend time with her two children. The cover shows a figure being carried in the sky by a cloud, is it a metaphor for the album’s title, (i.e. an unquestioning belief in something, even when it’s wrong), or a reflection of the honest, quirky and sometimes slightly obtuse music to be found on the record? The new LP was made over a two year period and Hayes says, “Some songs are sad, and others are less sad! Not sure there is a happy number in there”.
The catalyst for the new album was a move back to Ireland from London and more specifically Baltimore in west Cork, where the singer-songwriters Tessa Perry and Liz Clarke, encouraged Hayes to start performing again. Opener ‘Eye For An Eye‘ is an otherworldly song about trust and surrender, which features fellow Irish star Lisa Hannigan on backing vocals. ‘Another Love’ is a duet with Paul Noonan, the front man of the Irish group Bell X1. It’s an evocative song of two people finding solace in each other, whilst contending with the ghosts of past loves. ‘Hardwired‘ addresses people’s deep-seated reliance on technology, another act of blind faith perhaps and the fear of it being used as a means of control.
‘High And Low’ is an acoustic, finger-picking number, a song of loss and lost love. The final track, ‘Return Of Daughter‘ was inspired by a dream Hayes had, where women in Afghanistan rose up to defeat the Taliban. Hayes says that “It was a weird dream, unsettling but ultimately triumphant”. The music is founded on a one-chord, drone, which is interspersed with glockenspiel and harmonium.
Hayes says that she’s “forever toying with putting out a country album” and whilst this record isn’t it, it does have a certain wistful charm to it.
