Kathleen Edwards

"Oh Canada," a song from Anything for Flowers, the new CD by Kathleen Edwards (joined live by the Last Town Chorus), won't be mistaken for the national anthem of the singer-songwriter's native country. The track is a gritty attack on a society whose media shifts into overdrive when a white woman is shot but offers no headlines "when a black girl dies." Her touch is lighter on other tracks, but even when she uses a Sesame Street-like alphabet gimmick on the bouncy "The Cheapest Key," lines like "'A' is for all the times I bit my tongue/'B' is for bullshit, and you fed me some" still leave a mark. The album, Edwards's third studio full-length, is her finest to date, partly because of her rising confidence as a performer. Her voice is capable of moving from ringing to raspy as the subject matter demands — and that's a good thing, considering how demanding her subject matter can be.