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Sunday, May 11, 2008
Canadian Inspired by News, Hockey
By David Steinberg
Journal Staff Writer
Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards says her ideas for songs can come out of conversations just as easily as from observations.
“It's watching some of life's moments right in front of your eyes and that there's something special there,” Edwards said in a phone interview from Louisville, Ky.
“In the last few years it's been these little interactions and somebody, whether a stranger or an old friend, reveals this wonderful moment of trying to convey something. … That's a cool thing.”
Or the ideas can come out of a news story.
Edwards' song “Alicia Ross,” which is on her new album, “Asking for Flowers,” is an example.
The song is about a girl in her early 20s in Toronto who never made it home one night.
“Her mother went public in her search for her child. She was standing at a press conference, begging someone to come forward with information about her child,” said Edwards, who has been living in Toronto.
“It was one of those stories that took me back. ... I was really haunted by the idea that it could have been me and my mother.”
Edwards said she doesn't perform that song every night because maintaining a deep emotional connection to it is difficult.
“I just mean it's one of those songs that I hadn't realized the impact it had on me when I wrote it and how lasting it is in my mind,” she said.
Edwards and her five-piece band will be in concert Monday, May 12, at the Santa Fe Brewing Company.
Another song that in each verse hits on several important public issues — racism, environmental waste and white flight — is “Oh Canada.”
Its source came from an acquaintance who was part of a televised panel discussion about music.
“They were talking about the death of modern-day protest songs. I thought that was really true, (about people being) really apathetic,” Edwards said.
“I'm a young citizen of Canada and I vote and I like to think I participate in my community, and there are a lot of things that bother me.”
Another song on the CD takes a hard look at a longtime personal relationship.
The song “I Make the Dough, You Get the Glory,” has an edgy alt-country feel. It explores one person's view of a long, one-sided friendship.
This is one verse from the song: “You're cool and cred like Fogerty, I'm Elvis Presley in the '70s/You're Chateauneuf, I'm Yellow Label/You're the buffet, I'm just the table/I'm a Ford Tempo, you're a Maserati/You're the Great One, I'm Marty McSorley.”
Edwards likes to drop in hockey references in some of her songs, as she does in this one. The Great One refers to former hockey player Wayne Gretzky. McSorley was a teammate of Gretzky's.
“The lyric of McSorley has been a fun thing to sing every night,” she said.
Opening for Edwards in Santa Fe is The Last Town Chorus, which is the stage name of singer-lap steel guitarist Megan Hickey.
The New York Times said of Hickey: “She uses (the lap steel) for twangs and slides, but the effect isn't downhome. It's closer to U2 than Buck Owens.”
WHEN: 7:30 p.m. Monday, May 12
WHERE: Santa Fe Brewing Company, 35 Fire Place, off N.M. 14, Santa Fe
HOW MUCH: $15 in advance, $20 at the door
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