What does it sound like?:
Kathleen Edwards is a Canadian artist who, like other Canadian artists, always seems to hit the right note this side of the pond. Close enough to the US to appeal to those who like music in a broad Americana spectrum, distant enough not to offend those who don’t like country. Her self-imposed break from the music industry between 2014 and 2020, struggles with depression and her audience’s expectations of her, opening a coffee shop (Quitters) in an Ontario backwater town, and her subsequent return to music are all probably better known than the four albums she released beforehand.
Billionaire marks the second album since that return in 2020. While its predecessor Total Freedom marked a modest development of Edwards’ signature sound, a statement of intent, if you like, Billionaire makes it presence felt straight away with a much beefed up sound, chunkier guitar riffs and a sonic density that winningly complements Kathleen Edwards’ songwriting skills and deft way with a lyric. Partly responsible for this is the presence of Jason Isbell and members of the 400 Unit. Edwards manages to sound more strident and pissed off than ever before on many of these songs. Most of them rock with a fair old lick, from the opener Save Your Soul to the excellent Need a Ride. Jason Isbell’s guitar underpins most of the tracks, pushing Edwards’s voice to new strength almost as if she’s been forced to grow into her own vocal abilities. With Isbell on joint production credits, it’s a winning combination, delivering an album of pop-rockers that can’t fail to please those who are already in Kathleen Edwards’ camp. The harder edge to the material here is a welcome development too, fulfilling the glimpses of something fuller heard on some of the early albums where you hoped that she would rock out more and just be a bit less polite.
What does it all *mean*?
Is it too soon to pick an album of the year?
Goes well with…
….her 5 previous albums, of course.
Release Date:
22nd August 2025
Might suit people who like…
Are we still allowed to use the ‘A’ word on here?
I will say it for you – Americana. There are quite a few of us around and the more strident naysayers are dormant.
I have this on order on CD, but supplies are delayed. The Dodgers are only selling vinyl and downloads, so that’s a dead end too.
I have listened to streams, but I like physical product, so I am eagerly anticipating this.
Your review confirms what I felt from listening to a stream – that it’s another advance. I think each album since Failer has been an improvement on its predecessor. I loved Total Freedom. I was worried that the hiatus might have affected her songwriting ability. Not at all.
Intrigued to hear your claim of continuous improvement. I bought Failer on its release and it got a lot of plays, but didn’t leave me with enough of a grip to buy any subsequent albums.
Given that the OP says that Total Freedom offered only a ‘modest development’, and that this new one offers ‘a much beefed up sound … and … sonic density’ I was not at all sure that it represented an improvement on the clean, uncluttered feel that I very much appreciated with Failer, where her lyrics are such a strong part of the appeal.
The track in the clip above, while her voice is almost – but not quite – clearly audible as before, seems cumbersome and rather lumbering compared to the lighter touch I recall from Failer. As a previously fond admirer, I’m puzzled by the choice of this lumpen song as the flag-bearer for the new album. I’d probably be telling the CD player to skip it on subsequent plays. It sounds to me like Kath does Neil, not Kathleen.
Kath does Neil sounds like a pretty perfect combo to me. The extra beefiness (oh Moose, where ARE you?) is down to Jason Isbell. I read somewhere that Kathleen Edwards wept when he offered to play on her new album (tears of joy, I’m assuming), and I really like the results. ‘Need a Ride’ is a cracking song to my old ears, but I guess the flag-waver for the album is the one below. There’s plenty on here to please everyone I reckon.
Yeah, don’t get me wrong – I don’t think there’s much wrong with that concept either; I’m a Neil fan, and even more of a Jason fan – it’s just that on that debut album with which I’ve been familiar these last however many years, Neil is not in the room, and neither is Jason, and I didn’t miss either of them at the time or even now.
Now, Save Your Soul, for me, is much the better track – with a more livelier gnarliness, it’s maybe even more Neilishly Jasonic, and yet it doesn’t out-stay its welcome.
While we are unnecessarily, and possibly even unkindly, dropping names, doesn’t she sound (delightfully) like Edie Brickell from time to time?
You know what, I think I’ll invest.
Excellent review. One small correction. Stittsville, where the coffee shop was (now under new name and management), is a very affluent suburb of Ottawa, rather than a backwater town. I live in Kanata which borders on it and go there 4 or 5 times a week.
Local knowledge Dai, can’t beat it.
How many times a year does that t get converted to an h on the signs around Stittsville?
0
Tsk – kids today, eh?
No initiative.
I should probably have mentioned Kathleen Edwards’ Covers EP, released digitally earlier this year. It’s a collection of 8 largely acoustic versions of songs of varying vintage, including Jason Isbell’s ‘Traveling Alone’ on which she duets with Isbell himself, and which is one of the most affecting and heartfelt songs you will hear this year.
Yes, I really like that “Covers” mini-album, too.
I prefer her version of “Human Touch” to the Springsteen original.
https://kathleenedwards.bandcamp.com/album/covers
“better known than the four albums she released beforehand”.
Not round here, they’re not, to the extent I think her first 3 are all better than the subsequent return album. (Her 4th, the immediately pre-depression/Coffee shop Voyageur, was an odd ‘un, to my ears,) I concur the covers set is indeed rather jolly good. Maybe it is the idea of added beefiness that puts me off investigating, although I dare say I eventually will.
P.S. The featured track, Needs A Ride, is, however, so darn good as to make maybe do that sooner, being, as it is, so Canadian (or do I mean, Youngandcrazyhorsian?)
Just got down this far in the thread – exactamundo.
Wasn’t Voyageur the one that Justin Vernon got his hands on?
In more ways than one, yes.