Description:
`..[T]the guy makes merciless stabs of self-parody. `I don`t lock myself in a room and refuse to talk to my girlfriend for weeks at a time,` Hayden says. `I`m definitely not a sort of hermit, weirdo character. I`m more the kind of guy who spends most of his day wasting time and complaining about things,` he says, muffling a giggle. `I have long, long breakfasts, you know, from like noon until two at least, then I start complaining.` There is some truth to the mythology; over the course of his five stripped-back albums, his music and method took on a solitary shape. Recorded in Desser`s studio and in woods north of Toronto, In Field and Town embodies this small-scale sensibility. Yearning with the tender, minor-key minimalism of 2001`s Skyscraper National Park and the glowing acoustic arrangements of 2004`s Elk-Lake Serenade, the album pitches his oddly personal whimseys against an intimate but complete instrumental backdrop. The pealing horns and tumbling pop rhythms of Where and When, wrangling guitars and piano of Did I Wake Up Beside You? are fine examples. . . But it`s the wonderfully arranged Lonely Security Guard, an oddly narrated ode to a neighbourhood security guard told from the perspective of a would-be thief, which typifies his peculiar songwriting charms. "I just really enjoy coming up with a story that has a beginning, a middle and an end," he says. It`s just that sometimes it`s an end that you`re not expecting. Like this super friendly-looking security guard being a really tough guy,` he laughs. `I had a huge smile on my face when I came up with that.``-- Dan Rule, theage.com
