Jeff Hanson on misconceptions and Madam Owl

Over his lengthy career, St. Paul singer-songwriter Jeff Hanson has had two misconceptions dogging him: Many wrongly assume he's one of the Hanson brothers based on his name, while others wrongly assume he's a woman based on his delicate falsetto. Still, none of that's stopped Hanson from crafting aching, elegant folk songs in the singer-songwriter vein as a solo musician over three albums since 2000. His third release, 2008's Madam Owl, doesn't differ much sonically from its predecessors, but adds flourishes from a variety of new instruments. While on tour for Madam Owl, Hanson spoke to Decider about his new album, putting out a hypothetical metal record, and which misconception he wishes people would subscribe to. Hanson and his band will play a show Wednesday at The Frequency.
Decider: The press release for Madam Owl quotes you as saying, "I want this to be a Jeff Hanson record." What does that entail?
Jeff Hanson: [Laughs.] I just feel that in this line of work you get put in with a lot of other people and a lot of other names are mentioned when people listen to your music. Whether it's my voice or it's my songs, I really feel like it's my own record, and I feel that, to me, it's just a complete Jeff Hanson record. I feel like that if you listen to it—not that I don't have my own influences or anything—but I really feel like as far as developing my own style, it's a pretty personal record for me, whether it seems like it or not. It definitely feels more personal than the previous two, that's for sure.
One thing people haven’t picked up on is I have a song called “Your Only Son,” which I wrote in response to the war. I haven’t heard one mention of that. It was actually a response to the story of the architects of this disaster in Iraq, who were setting this all up, and we know why they’re doing it, the profits they’re getting. We’re sending all of our family out to die. You take somebody like the Cindy [Sheehan], or some mother who steps out and says “I can’t believe I lost my son for this,” And the media demonizes this person, saying, “What a horrible human being you are. It’s downright un-American.” That was definitely the approach with that song, and I was surprised I didn’t see anything written about that.
It wasn’t even about the invasion itself. It was simply the absolute, horrifying experience of looking at a nation being thrown into this, and actually having the people who put this whole thing together tell us we’re not allowed to say anything bad about it. You may have lost a kid in this thing, but you’re not allowed to stand up and say you’re not happy with it. That’s completely unacceptable. That struck a chord in me for sure.
D: In other interviews you've mentioned not going to shows. Is that a badge of honor for you, or more a reaction to how clique-ish music can be?
JH: It's just because I'm a big nerd. I sit at home with my wife and our favorite thing to do is take the dogs for a walk, go out to dinner, and rent a movie. I can write a song, but I don't know how to talk to someone about it and make it out to be super-cool to someone else. I put my music out there because it's important to me and it's what I do, but I don't expect anything. I don't feel like anything is owed to me. Wherever it goes from here, we'll see.
D: Everything on Madam Owl is acoustic except for the electric bass on "The Hills." Why was that the exception?
JH: I just think that it was more [of a] driving song. That song seems a little more intense to me.