Since 1997, singer/songwriter Michael Hayes has quietly built a catalogue of over a hundred songs, in an impressive body of work that includes six full-length albums with bands Everything Else, Lemonpeeler, and the Vinyl Skyway. Michael and his bandmates have crossed the great indie-music divide, going broke on tours of the United States and making records the old fashioned way. With no regrets, Hayes continues to believe in his trade, and the quality of his music. After all, where would inspiration be without struggle?

Last year, Hayes released a 22 track compilation of his work to highlight an impressive (if unceremonious) career as an independent rock musician. The CD, entitled Diamonds Down the Drain, features liner notes from Boston Globe rock critic Jonathan Perry, who describes it as "a captivating document of Michael's music and the scope of his sublime gifts. Indeed, these songs sparkle and glint like the diamonds they are, and the songs Hayes wrote with his criminally under-heard bands, Lemonpeeler and the Vinyl Skyway, weren't on that radio. But they should have been. In another age, they almost certainly would have been."

Born in St. Paul, Minnesota and raised the youngest of nine children, Hayes lost his mother to cancer at the age of six. A natural defense to this sadness was refuge in the record collections of his older siblings. He threw himself into music early, ditching his piano lessons for the acoustic guitar, which he learned to play by ear. After satisfying the traditional family expectation of a college degree, Hayes turned to his passion. In 1995, he submitted applications with his first demo (the song 9:07), to the Liverpool Institute and Berklee College of Music. He was accepted on scholarship to both schools and in 1996, Michael commenced his studies in Boston, where he also began to participate in a burgeoning folk-rock scene.

In 2001, Lemonpeeler released their debut "the First Time," bringing the hit Automatic to college radio, earning a Boston Music Award nomination and completing a tour of the United States. Several years later, Lemonpeeler broke up and Hayes founded the Vinyl Skyway, whose debut was featured on Nic Harcourt's Morning Becomes Eclectic. In 2007, Hayes produced "From Telegraph Hill," the Vinyl Skyway's sophomore record, earning international press acclaim and hailed as one of 2007's best by numerous publications.

Hayes' strengths as a songwriter are in channeling a swinging pop intuition with an incisive and bittersweet lyrical outlook, and his work has been described by critics as "lush summery music in the vein of the Thrills, the Pernice Brothers, or Lindsay Buckingham-era Fleetwood Mac."

Since 2008, Hayes has been preoccupied with being a Father to two beautiful babies. After nearly a three year hiatus, he is excited to be back in the studio (Kissy Pig, Allston, MA) with his new songs, and hopes to release another album in 2011.