Toronto’s Andrea England Draws on Heartbreak for Nostalgic Song “Halifax” from New EP, Evidence of Love

Every decade or so, award-winning songwriter-singer Andrea England, founder of the popular songwriter circle concert series Four Chords and the Truth, becomes singer-songwriter Andrea England. The Toronto-based musician, whose songs have been recorded by everyone from Meghan Patrick and Don Amero to ex-Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger, has released her long-awaited ambient Americana EP, Evidence of Love, produced by JUNO Award winner Hill Kourkoutis (Aysanabee, Digging Roots). Andrea is the primary songwriter, with co-write credits to Tenille Townes on “Stone” and Liz Rodrigues (Celine, Eminem) and James Bryan (Drake, Nelly Furtado) on “Cover to Cover”.

Award-winning Nova Scotia artist Carleton Stone can be heard in the ambivalent first single “Halifax” about the conflicted emotions that come from living away from home. “I started my life and artist career in Halifax, and my time there influenced a big part of who I am as a woman and songwriter,” Andrea explains. “It’s a nostalgic song about a lost love forever connected to a place and a time – and to write it, I drew upon my first real heartbreak – one that literally led me to leave a city I loved.”

As a whole, Evidence of Love is love in all its many complicated forms. It’s a lifetime of love. “I don’t regret any of the hurt I’ve gone through because I’ve loved too much,” says Andrea. “If I was on my deathbed, would I have any regrets? Maybe a few, but I wouldn’t regret loving.”

Andrea’s last body of work, 2012’s Hope and Other Sins, produced by Grammy winner Colin Linden, spent several weeks on Cashbox Canada’s top 50 folk chart and hit No. 1 on Galaxy’s folk roots radio channel. Her 2004 album, Lemonade, won a John Lennon Songwriting Contest, and her debut EP, 1999’s Heart Wide Open, included the very first song she wrote, “Eyes Wide Shut,” which hit No. 1 on the nationally syndicated East Coast Countdown.