Kathleen Edwards Readies New Project ‘Total Freedom’ For August

Kathleen Edwards. Photo credit: Remi Theriault

Kathleen Edwards is set to release her new album, Total Freedom, Aug. 14 on Dualtone. In advance of the new project, the album’s first single, “Options Open,” debuted yesterday (May 19).

Co-produced by Edwards, longtime collaborator/guitarist Jim Bryson and producer and musician Ian Fitchuk, Total Freedom marks a major return for Edwards, who took an extended step away from music in 2014. After spending the last six years running her coffee shop, bar and café in her hometown of Stittsville, Ottawa, Edwards is back with a refreshed creative outlook and a new sense of freedom.

“I had no desire to write, no desire to play,” she explains. “It allowed me all the time and space I needed to even just enjoy listening to music again. There were so many times where, if I was thinking about my own writing or playing, my heart just wasn’t in it. I don’t want to write songs that are going to keep me in a dark place for two years. I didn’t have to carry a lot of the pressure of whatever course I was on previously…There’s a pressure sometimes to keep that ball rolling, and that’s what was so freeing about stopping altogether and starting again. I realized I’m entirely in control and deciding what my course of action is.”

Total Freedom is Edwards’ fifth studio album, and her first since 2012’s Voyageur. She is a five-time Juno Award nominee, and has also had her music featured in several TV shows including Grey’s Anatomy, One Tree Hill, Hart of Dixie, House and more.