On her second album Hayley Heynderickx seeks an antidote for modern living.

Hayley Heynderickx ends her second solo album wondering if there is “an artistry to going away”. Which may be something she pondered during the six year gestation period between her debut I Need to Start a Garden, which earned her a place in several end of year lists, and its follow up. To leave such a gap between albums in an industry that tends to ram home the message of striking while the iron is hot is rare, but as Heynderickx confessed to Rolling Stone Magazine in 2018, she has never been too concerned in following the mapped out music business route, finding most value in jamming with her friends in her backyard.

Developing an understanding as to what is valuable and natural, while also searching for ways to avoid the constant pulls on our attention that lead us toward distraction and dissatisfaction are the focus of Seed of a Seed. Heynderickx is not immune from these things - she confesses to doomscrolling, spending money on crap she doesn’t need and avoiding replying to texts. But whereas I Need to Start a Garden culminated in Heynderickx yelling the title track repeatedly as if a singular solution to the anxiety caused by capitalist society, on Seed of a Seed she directs her gaze away from the inward nature of her debut and seeks to strike a balance between modernity and the environment.

Heyndrickx diagnoses the drawbacks of the modern world in a matter-of-fact, lilting voice that presents her as an understanding friend to our problems. A lack of free time, the constant marketing of products towards our eyeballs, overconsumption and constantly feeling tired are teased out over her gently finger-picked guitar, a style heavily influenced by guitarist John Fahey and one that continues from I Need to Start a Garden. Bustles of drums, strings of electric guitar, cello (“Seed of a Seed”) and trombone (“Sorry Fahey”) help to beef the songs up. 

On “Foxglove” Heyndrickx daydreams of ditching the city and these drains on energy to live a simpler life. “Redwoods (Anxious God)” finds her speaking to water and trees while wandering through woods, shaken to learn their voices have been drowned out by cell phone ringing.

The notion of escaping the rat race to live a more deliberate existence is far from a novel concept. What makes Seed in a Seed most appealing is the feeling that Heyndrickx is not prescribing a cure for our ills or a design for life.

On opening track “Gemini” Heynderickx is an uncertain individual who locks her keys inside her car, drops dishes and inadvertently annoys people with the flightiness of her conversation. Across the ten tracks the album holds, Heyndrickx sounds like she is trying to settle a universal anxiety within herself and finds being closer to the environment helpful along with intimate moments; making someone a cup of tea, sandwiches shared on a road trip, a hand next to her own. Or as Heynderickx puts it on the album’s final song “Swoop”, a song that recounts the bravery of her grandmother’s immigration from Hong Kong, there is respite to be found “in the day to day”.