AFTER 20 YEARS of touring and recording, Kathleen Edwards needed a minute. “It was an inside joke that my bandmates made to me one day,” Edwards says. “[They’d say], ‘You obviously need to take a break from music, so just quit music, open a coffee shop and call it Quitters.’”
Kathleen Edwards performs in London February 28, 2012
ANNABEL STAFF/REDFERNS VIA GETTY IMAGES
It turns out baking muffins and making latte art (“My hearts look like a butt,” she laments) for six years was just the thing for Edwards. “It gave me back that gift of being fresh and new again [like] when I made my first record,” she says. That change is evident on Total Freedom, an album of graceful yet forceful new tunes that showcase the independent streak Edwards has fostered throughout her career.