Kathleen Edwards: This Mortal Coil Over the last three years, Kathleen Edwards experienced what could be called a quarter-life crisis. After touring behind her 2005 album Back to Me (Zoë/Rounder), she came home wondering if she'd ever write another song. When Edwards finally broke through, she emerged as a different kind of songwriter than she was before. Gone were most of the songs about love and relationships that filled her first two albums. Her latest, Asking for Flowers, focuses on far weightier topics than boy-meets-girl. 'The subject matter of a lot of the stuff I'm writing about now is more mature," she says. "I wrote songs about my family, friends' families, memories and growing up to realize your parents actually taught you something instead of just working against you." Now 29, Edwards and her friends are wondering where their lives will take them as they enter adulthood, and who they'll end up being when they hit middle age. It's a question Edwards is struggling to answer. "I don't even know if I'll be a musician all my life," she says. "It's scary to think of the consequences of life and choosing certain paths. Now that I'm a bit older, I'm less afraid to make those choices, but more aware of the consequences that come with them. It's exciting but daunting." With age also comes an awareness of mortality. In one of the album's most striking images, Edwards remembers watching her grandmother die ("Scared at Night"). It's the only time Edwards ever saw someone die, and she distinctly remembers her father making her visit her grandmother's deathbed. "I think it was parental instinct that this was an important part of life and I needed to be there," she remembers. "It's sad, but it was a relief to let her go. It helped me put things in perspective with my family, that they won't be around forever and I need to make the best of the time we have together." Much of Asking for Flowers can be seen as Edwards trying to reconcile the family-focused adult she is now with the self-described "stubborn little bitch" she was as a teenager. Like most parents, Edwards' mother and father weren't happy about her decision to forego a steady job with benefits to become a full-time musician. So they were probably shocked to hear Edwards providing advice to a friend who has a turbulent relationship with her own mother in the song "Run," which Edwards describes as an attempt to get her friend to see her parents as people, not just mom and dad. But Asking for Flowers' centerpiece, "Alicia Ross" is focused not on Edwards' family, but on one she never met. The song is based on the true story of a Canadian girl who was murdered and her mother's reaction. "I felt very moved by that story," she says. "I felt like it could have been me, or my best friend, or anybody who's supposed to be coming home and just doesn't show up one day. 'There's a reason parents hate seeing kids get tattoos," she continued. 'They spend their whole lives protecting you from falling, getting a scar or poking out your eyes. Can you imagine going from that to knowing your daughter was killed by somebody?" Edwards is donating all the royalties from "Alicia Ross" to a memorial fund set up by Ross' parents. While Edwards hasn't yet met the Ross family in person, they reached out to her shortly after they heard that Edwards began playing the song live. So far, they've been supportive of the song, but Edwards still wonders what it will be like to meet Alicia's mother face to face. "I'm terrified of meeting her," she admits. "It's scary to write a song about someone's child you never knew. Maybe there's a certain word or image I used that she won't like. The last thing you want to do is upset somebody. I'm trying to honor the memory of someone I never knew. I hope the family can look at that and get something positive from it." Hal Bienstock harpmagazine.com				Album reviews Feature articles Interviews Show reviews