Eliza Edens – We’ll Become the Flowers

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While grief is something Eliza Edens explores on her sophomore album We’ll Become the Flowers, that’s not all she explores. Indeed, there is grief. The kind that comes from illness and death, grief at the loss of a relationship, grief can come from just about anything. But there’s also healing, a certain kind of strength and all the other things we learn in the aftermath of everything we’ve survived. This music is about all of that.

Part of what makes We’ll Become the Flowers so remarkable is how Edens tells her stories. She works almost like a novelist, starting in the middle rather than spelling everything out. Along the way, you pick up what’s going on and how it has affected her. It makes for a most intriguing experience, and it’s one that begins with the question, “How do I get there?” On ‘How‘ her guitar almost repeats the question musically before other instruments enter and tangle with the tune. As she continues, we discover the things that haven’t worked, “I tried to start by weeding through/The trauma in my bones/To rearrange the memories/Forgive and not keep score.” The problem is that none of us are ever quite sure.

Using a guitar tuning and style adapted from Nick Drake, Edens sings of “Westlawn Cemetery,” which was a comforting place for her during the pandemic. From that locale, she began to chart the changes going on around her, “It’s got me thinking how my mother’s getting older/ and how I’m making her dinner at night.” As she watches her mother getting more ill, she realizes, “We’ll become the flowers in time.” Which, of course, became the name of the album.

While “I Needed You” starts almost like a country tune, where this song ends up seems in many ways altogether different. What begins with a sense of nostalgia over a former lover appears to change every time Edens sings, “I Needed You.” By the song’s end, there’s nothing remotely resembling a romantic notion of the past. She bears a harder opinion of things, laughing after she sings the same three-word phrase.

“Tom and Jerry” may initially feel out of place with its semi-bossa nova beat but it takes a more whimsical look at the metaphorical nature of a relationship gone bad using the cat and mouse qualities of the title’s protagonists. Yet the song really isn’t out of place; it’s more of a palate cleanser before digging deeper into the nature of relationships.

A fine guitarist working with a sympathetic band, Eliza Edens proves why she is a voice that needs to be heard. Not only does she work from established forms of folk, but she also explores the qualities that lie at the heart of who we are on We’ll Become the Flowers. It’s required listening for anyone who’s ever been in love.

Order ‘We’ll Become Flowes’ via Bandcamp – https://eliza-edens.bandcamp.com/album/well-become-the-flowers