The third full-length album from the Swedish quintet
Edson builds on the strengths of its predecessors by stripping things away. This isn't "minimalist" music, in the sense of being austere or uninviting. But from the opening track, "And Then She Flung Me the Truth," which consists of not much more than Helena Soderman's piano and Pelle Carlberg's vocals, to the equally quiet closing ballad, "In the Meantime,"
Every Day, Every Second has a miniaturist quality, a feeling of intimacy conveyed by Carlberg's confessional, conversational lyrics and the hushed tones of the arrangements. Even on the soaring single "One Last Song About You Know What," which has an achingly lovely chorus that
Coldplay would kill for,
Edson play and sing as if they're trying not to bother the people in the next apartment. Elements of classic '70s singer/songwriter pop creep into the songs at times, particularly in Soderman's prominent piano, which occasionally echoes
Carole King and
Todd Rundgren on songs like the haunting "Underdog/Overdog." The real points of comparison, however, are the elegant constructions of classic
Prefab Sprout and the D.I.Y. bedroom pop of U.K. indie heroes like
the Field Mice. ~ Stewart Mason