Editor’s Note: For a related article, see the One Track Mind feature from Pulp.
Bill Edwards is satisfied with having one less personal collection of music in the world.
The Ann Arbor, Michigan, singer-songwriter adopts that mindset and overarching premise for his new album, Enough About Me, and its title track.
“I read American Songwriter magazine, and there’s an article on the cover that says, ‘So-and-so has put out their most personal album yet,’” said Edwards, who’s also multi-instrumentalist.
“I don’t think a statement is intrinsically more important because it’s your personal history. It can be, if it’s something you’ve gone through and it’s really important and something that people will recognize and feel themselves, but there are other ways to do it too.”
On the title track, Edwards sings, “Must we keep dronin’ on / About ourselves? / It’s a big ol’ world out there / Can’t we talk about somethin’ else?”
“I don’t mean anything against anybody,” he said. “People do what they need to do or what they want to do, but just for me at my stage of life and stage of music production, I was ready to say, ‘You know, I want to write about something else; I want to write about other people.’”
Featuring 14 tracks, the country-bluegrass album explores songs from the perspectives of several characters, including women, men, teens, veterans, sanitation workers, and drifters.
The Stratton Setlist 