Paul Mitch
J. Hardin (left) sings lead and Hayward Williams, harmony.
Last year was a banner year for local music releases. Count among them the hushed and haunted folk-rock songs composed by Madison’s J. Hardin and Milwaukee-based Hayward Williams. Their debut album is also the name of their duo: Coyote Brother.
Though the word brother in the name is singular, they sing together like brothers of the same mother, in the tradition of the Everlys or Jim and Jesse McReynolds. On the new album, Hardin sings lead, and Williams adds harmony throughout, because, as Hardin puts it, “Williams is a harmony machine.”
In addition to the hellhound vocals, the duo has moving parts galore in this project, an album that invites the listener to sit down and listen to it all in one sitting. The first track, “A Part of Me That’s Lonely” forecasts everything to come: Hardin and Williams’ crisp acoustic and electric guitars and patient, colorful piano notes in the supple hands of Brooks Milgate.
Hardin calls Milgate “The Holy Grail.” His piano and Hammond B3 parts are some of the warmest parts of these weary-hearted compositions. And Coyote Brother opens the bomb doors every time Eric Heywood sounds off on the pedal steel. Heywood is at the top of the call sheet among the best steel players in the country; he performs with The Pretenders and Son Volt. Williams first encountered him as a fellow player in Jeffrey Foucault’s band. Coyote Brother picks up with Heywood where that left off.
Hardin and Williams’ separated-at-birth story started a dozen years ago, back when they were both signed to small, Wisconsin independent labels. The labels worked together to bring in supporting musicians on various recordings. As a result, Hardin and Williams found themselves sitting across the studio from one another. They became friends, and Williams played and sang on a 2008 Hardin release. Then, around 2011, Hardin’s life became unbuckled, and he retreated from writing and performing to deal with what he describes as “mental maladjustments.” He committed the next four years to making some life — and life-saving — changes.
Hardin reemerged in 2015 and poured his mental health recovery experiences into the utterly astonishing album, The Piasa Bird. Prior to recording the music, he asked Williams to produce it.
“I told him I’d cut his grass for a summer, and if he didn’t do it, I wasn’t going to make it at all,” says Hardin. Williams took him up on it and, well, fast forward to Coyote Brother. “As I was beginning to prepare for another solo album,” Hardin recalls, “I realized all of the songs I was writing were being written with Hayward in mind, to be performed as a duo.”
Williams says Hardin’s storytelling merges with his style. “I tend to graft words to melodies, finding deeper meaning in them as I edit and re-edit,” he says. “John is lyrically driven with a point of view.” He adds, with good-natured envy, Hardin’s “finger picking is always something I’ve been jealous of.”
It all comes together in a song like “Dharma Blues,” a rolling ballad that projects the best of the popular, modern appeal of the Milk Carton Kids with none of the pretension. “London Dry” comes across as a safe-harbored children’s lullaby…but with some serious, grown-up remorse.
The duo is in the midst of composing a second batch of songs for an album sometime in 2020. They also continue collaborations with other local and national artists. Hardin is working on a new solo project, which includes contributions from Shane Leonard (Field Report, The Stray Birds), who produced and played on it.
For all the artistic questions that are answered in a collaboration like Coyote Brother, one still begs an answer. Did Hardin ever make good on his offer to mow Williams’ grass all summer?
“No. I did not,” Hardin says. “He has not let me forget it.”
