Kathleen Edwards

(May 2008)

Interview by Adam McKibbin

Photograph by Todd V. Wolfson

Previously published in abridged form on ARTISTdirect

On her third album, Asking For Flowers, Kathleen Edwards continues to build her reputation as one of the leading lights in alt-country. With a sound that falls somewhere in the great wide open between Neil Young and Lucinda Williams, Edwards’ songwriting world is populated by a rowdy but sympathetic cast of characters: petty criminals, young hussies, fuck-ups and ne’er-do-wells, and heartbreakers and the heartbroken.

On Asking For Flowers, she writes some of her most personal songs to date - but songs that are hardly autobiographical. Instead, she takes a hard look at some issues facing her country (Canada) and channels an emotional real-life murder ripped from the headlines.

Edwards chatted recently about pet peeves, the reasons she considers herself “charmed” and the perils of getting political and getting personal.

It seems like you’ve been pretty steadily gaining momentum from album to album. Do you feel like you’ve had a pretty even trajectory to your career so far, or have there been more ups and downs than it may appear to outsiders?

Well, this has been a really amazing week for me - my record came out, and the press has been pretty great. But six months ago, I thought I had made the worst record I had ever made. I was very uncertain about my future as a recording artist. My label never really told me what they thought of the record, so there were a couple months there where I really wasn’t sure if I was any good.

And the album was finished at that point?

The album was finished, yeah. I’d taken a bigger role in making this record, and in doing so you kind of take the brunt of opinions a lot more. It is a roller coaster. Some weeks you think “No one is going to buy my record. I’m not going to get any support from the radio stations that played me in the past because of the direction I’ve gone on.” And then there are days that you find out that you’re going to be on David Letterman and it’s like “Wow, holy fuck, I am doing okay.” So, yeah, it is a constant roller coaster, but I’ve been really lucky. Would I like to have a guy that does lighting? Would I like to stay in nicer hotels? Yeah, but that stuff is not really important. I get to play music and have a great band and I get to pay them - hopefully I’ll get to pay them more in the future. It’s all good.

You don’t even have to leave your husband at home when you go out on tour.

Yeah. [Laughs] Thanks for bringing that up. No, I’m really lucky.

I wrote a review of one of your shows a few years back and said that I could imagine the audience listening to you for decades to come. But some artists have a magic number in mind - a certain number of years or albums, and then they want to hang it up and get off the road. Do you have a future Plan B? Or will we be lugging ourselves out to your shows in 30 years?

I hope so. I don’t know why anyone would spend all these years doing the very unsexy parts of playing music for a living and then all of a sudden hang it all up - unless you’re Shania Twain and you have a chateau in Switzerland. But even then, that’s even more reason to be creative and enjoy life. But it’s weird - maybe if you asked me three years ago, I would have said, “You know what, I am fed up and exhausted. I just want to go home and live a normal life.” But I have been home for about a year - maybe actually two - and I really have a new perspective on this whole whirlwind of being creative and working hard and the rewards of playing music. I’m not talking about the financial rewards. I’m doing what I think I was always supposed to do, and I’m having success doing it. I can’t imagine a more charmed existence, really. Obviously there are struggles. Would I like to be a mom? Probably, yeah, at some point. Would I like to maybe not have to give birth in the back of a tour bus? Yeah, that would be ideal. But I’m so fulfilled playing music. It’s so fulfilling to work hard and play shows and meet people - and to be in Stockholm one day and Denver the next. I mean… holy shit!

I was talking to this guy in a band and he has a young daughter and I said, “Better teach her how to play the drums, that way she’ll always have a job.” This one guy piped in and said, “Christ, don’t get your kid playing music - this is a shitty way to live your life.” I was like, “Fuck, man, you shoulda quit a long time ago.” Just go home. If you don’t like it, there are a lot of fucking people who live and breathe it. Shut the fuck up. Shit or get off the pot. I hate that attitude.

Asking For Flowers seems a little more externally driven than its predecessors. Was there a conscious shift in songwriting approach?

Yeah, I think my shift was that I was willing to try new things and just go with it. “Goodnight California,” the last track on the record - I had several people say to me “I don’t think that song is finished.” And I was just like, “Yeah, it’s finished.” [Laughs] I was trying to find a less conventional approach to writing songs. There isn’t a formula that has to exist for something to be musical.

You know whose record I’ve been listening to that’s the epitome of that? Neko Case’s Fox Confessor Brings The Flood. Those songs - if you actually sit down and think about the layout of those songs, they’re so strangely random. But it’s such a musical record and it’s so easy to listen to it. It just falls in front of you and it’s so beautiful. I’m so impressed with how she finished those songs because they’re not orderly.

Let’s talk about Jim Scott for a moment.

Yay!

One of his crowning achievements is back in the public consciousness right now with the reissue of [Whiskeytown’s] Stranger’s Almanac.

I know, it’s such a weird coincidence that it got reissued on the day my record came out.

I know that’s an album that’s been near and dear to your heart for a while. How did you discover it initially?

Um, I’m slightly mortified with this answer, but here we go: I worked at Starbucks. There’s was an Americana/alt-country mix. Before they did satellite radio, you’d get these tapes with like four hours of music. I was listening to this alt-country one and every time a couple of these songs came on, I was like, “Wow, I love that song!” I looked at the liner notes and it was this band called Whiskeytown. So I searched it out and bought Stranger’s Almanac - and it was such an amazing record. I listened to it all the time.

And now you have Jim working with you. What kind of a role does he play in the studio?

Jim’s role was setting me up with players that he wanted to hear me play with, and I trusted him wholeheartedly - I knew he was going to pick great guys. He just set the tone. When a take was hard to get, he really knew how to communicate to people to get them to try this or try that. Things never got dark or frustrating or annoying. He’s so level and so relaxed and so experienced. He just really knew how to assert a good take and pick the good takes and make everyone feel good about the direction we were going in. He really made me understand or appreciate the idea that things should come naturally - don’t overthink stuff, don’t get wrapped up in details that aren’t important.

I read a recent interview with you where you said that some people told you that you weren’t “entitled” to write politically charged songs. Who were those people?

Well, actually, one of the guys was a good friend of mine and a bandmate. He didn’t really like a song and maybe still doesn’t - and that’s okay. I think he thought it was preachy.

We’re talking about “Oh Canada”?

Yeah. And I can appreciate that. They don’t have to put their names on it. I had a very heated discussion with somebody about taking that song off the record. Then I just realized “What the fuck is the big deal?” Someone is going to complain that I’m standing up for other people? What the fuck is wrong with that?

Well, I’ve talked to some songwriters who will be tremendously open and autobiographical about almost anything in their lives - in conversation and in their songs. But then they have the notion that political beliefs are taboo.

Right. You know, I’m the kind of person that believes that politics is my business. I grew up not knowing who my parents voted for - they never told me, and they still don’t tell me. I absolutely have no issue with people who champion or put down politicians or political ideals. That’s great, I’m all for it. I don’t want to be one of those people, but what I do believe in being vocal about is standing up for people who don’t always have a voice about the lives they lead and the situations they find themselves in. I’m much more a champion of the rights of citizens to make things better. I’m not going to stand up on stage and talk about how lame it is that half of you guys in the room voted for Bush and he’s ruining your country. I don’t believe I’m ever going to be that person, but I believe there are really positive ways to bring issues to light and to support positive causes. And some of those causes are political, but I don’t think I have to stand up with a flag and say “I vote for this person and I support this political party” in order to be somebody who helps positive change exist.

“Oh Canada” is also an interesting song for Americans to listen to. There’s a tendency for Americans - particularly young, left-leaning Americans - to throw up their hands and say “Fuck it, I’m moving to Canada where things are perfect!”

I’m such a proud Canadian, and I think that’s also why I wrote the song. I’m not pointing the finger - I’m including myself when I say these things aren’t right. I own a car, I drive. Who am I to say that people shouldn’t be driving so much? I’m really prepared to deal with any backlash that exists. I think we have a complacent mentality in Canada. We’re better off than America in our own minds, but there are a lot of things that we don’t wind up addressing because of that.

One cause of Canadian envy for American musicians is that the Canadian government actually funds the arts. They helped out with a video of yours. Is it an easy process?

Yeah. You can apply for all sorts of funding. You can get money to record, to make a music video - I think part of the reason that it exists is that a lot of broadcasters are under pressure to support a certain amount of Canadian content. So it works to their favor to have people making videos so they can play that new material. Generally, they tend to fund people who have some sort of infrastructure, so the money will actually be useful. I would not be getting off the ground without their support.

How much of a challenge will it be to play an emotionally charged like “Alicia Ross” night after night after night? I would think it would be hard to transition from that right into “The Cheapest Key” or “Westby.”

Yeah, I’ve actually really thought about that. I am a little worried about it. I haven’t really played “Alicia Ross” live, and I think it’s really going to be a challenge. I want to do the song justice and be committed to it every time I play it. There have been times when I’ve gotten very emotional playing the song, and I’ve never had so many people be emotionally affected by a song.