Rating: NNN
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Though she writes herself as a romantic cynic, a hard-drinking drifter, a tough-ass broad who’ll make you pay if you cross her, the strength of Kathleen Edwards’s songcraft lies in the contrast between those lyrics and the questioning undercurrent in her voice, the slight falter and delicate melancholy. She’s trying to convince herself she’s truly the ball-buster who’ll make the bastard turn tail on the title song, or the Artful Dodger on Independent Thief. Sharp writing and producer Colin Cripps’s knack for wringing a range of emotion out of Edwards’s voice make Back To Me a far stronger album than her Failer debut, but while the pedal steel, organ and slide guitar are lovely, over-production drowns the singer’s husky but brittle vocals on too many tracks. The spare Away, with its simple backdrop of pedal steel and acoustic strumming, is the real highlight.
