Naimee Coleman: The Edges - Mature and accomplished return for the Dublin singer-songwriter

The Dublin songwriter and singer Naimee Coleman has had a disjointed music career. In the mid-1990s she went from being a member of much-admired band The Wilde Oscars to a hot-button solo act signed by EMI. But, as so often happens, Coleman’s hot-button status cooled. By 2004 she had relocated to Los Angeles, where she immersed herself in the local music scene, married Katy Perry’s drummer and musical director, Adam Marcello, and made quite the name for herself as a songwriter for movies and television shows. She’s now settled back home in Ireland.

The Edges, Coleman’s first album since 2001’s Bring Down the Moon, showcases a far more mature songwriter with more than two decades of life’s highs and lows trailing behind her. While her early material was never less than sincere (her 1996 debut, Silver Wrists, is a long-lost gem), the passing years have allowed her creative wrinkles to underscore just how layered a tunesmith she is. The Edges brims with recollections of previous lives (Because I Told You So, Lost Our Way, Survive, Once That Girl – “seasons change and pull you and push you apart,” she sings in the latter song) that Coleman brings into focus via finely wrought acoustic guitar/piano/string arrangements.

Even the album’s sole cover version, Joy Division’s Love Will Tear Us Apart, is presented in a way (much respected, clearly, but individualistic) that showcases the quality on offer here.