Jensen McRae could’ve been down for the count. “The most profound choices of my life,” she says, “have often felt like things I did before I was ready to do, and I had to grow into them.” McRae’s songs give shape to these leaps, cliff jumps, and trust falls, and on her new album, I Don’t Know How But They Found Me!, she goes further than ever, evolving from a promising young artist into a fully realized songwriter and star.

“It’s about realizing what you can’t outrun, and what follows when you have withstood what you thought might crush you,” she explains. “There are things that can happen to us—unthinkable, untenable things—that threaten our safety in our own bodies. They happen, and you feel like the only option is escape. In truth, the only way out is in—back into the place you have always lived.” A home—Jensen front and center, possibly leaving, possibly arriving—adorns the album artwork. “You can leave the city, you can leave the lover,” McRae continues, “but you can never leave yourself.”

From the beginning, fans have connected to McRae’s sharp, evocative, clear-eyed songwriting. An avid journaler, she has been documenting her life since she was 18. Her first album, Are You Happy Now?, was a mission statement from an artist who grew up an automatic outsider: a Black Jewish girl from Los Angeles determined to make folk music despite the world’s attempts to box her into more stereotypical genres. Drawing inspiration from songwriting heroes like Alicia Keys, Carole King, James Taylor, and Stevie Wonder, McRae built a sonic world entirely her own. As her audience grew, the album became “the record of my coming-of-age—but a quiet one, mostly taking place inside my own head.”

I Don’t Know How But They Found Me! unfolds against the backdrop of romantic turbulence and McRae’s rapidly expanding fanbase. “I had never been in love before—not really,” she says. “Then I had two life-altering relationships back to back in my early twenties. This album explores how love and intimacy can knock the wind out of you, take your legs out from under you.”
McRae has also experienced multiple viral moments. In 2023, she shared a verse and chorus online—barely more than a demo—and it took off. Covers, duets, and an avalanche of new fans followed, including Justin Bieber, Stormzy, and Dan Nigro. That song became “Massachusetts,” her first release with Dead Oceans.

The album further affirms McRae’s defiance of expectations as she deepens her singer-songwriter credentials and claims space for young Black women in the genre. “I still feel like I’m pushing a boulder up a hill,” she says. “Even with success and hard work, I hit walls that aren’t there for other people. That’s part of why I make music—to be seen and to help others feel seen. But I remain somewhat misunderstood.”

McRae’s voice captures both the heartbreak of being left and of doing the leaving. Wispy and textured at times, clear and bright at others, her singing is as multidimensional as her lyrics. When the country-leaning single “Savannah” reaches its crescendo, piano and guitar stack beneath her as she delivers scathing lines with grit and conviction: “You swore you’d raise our kids to end up just like you / well you’re a false prophet / and that’s a goddamn promise.”

“Let Me Be Wrong” is a buoyant ode to rejecting perfectionism, building from a simple acoustic melody into a full-bodied release, capped by a raw, crowd-ready line—“fuck those girls got everything.” The softer but devastating “Daffodils” explores intimacy and pain, with the line “he cleaned my clock / he bought me daffodils,” which McRae calls one of the album’s most emotionally brutal moments. Along with “Tuesday,” it addresses the album’s heaviest themes, including substance abuse and assault, and how those dangers creep in slowly within intimate relationships. “Mother Wound” examines how emotional unavailability reshapes expectations of love.

Despite its weight, the album finds moments of light. Opener “The Rearranger” shimmers with nostalgia. “Novelty” is a situationship anthem celebrating the one that got away. “Praying For Your Downfall” blends snark and charm, marking McRae’s shift into self-assuredness and perspective.

McRae recorded the album in North Carolina with producer Brad Cook (Waxahatchee, Bon Iver), alongside Nathan Stocker of Hippocampus on guitar, Matthew McCaughan of Bon Iver on drums, and her brother Holden McRae on keys. “It felt like summer camp,” she says. “None of us wanted to leave. It was ten joyful days of pure creative expression.”

The album’s title comes from Back to the Future, referencing a character who survives a hail of bullets. “I connected with the idea that I could’ve collapsed beneath the weight of what happened to me—but I didn’t,” McRae says. “I didn’t even know it, but I was bulletproof the whole time.”

Jackie Evans

For New York based singer/songwriter Jackie Evans, music has always been the only option, but exactly how her career in music would take shape was unclear until just a few years ago when she began gaining fans for her nostalgic piano ballads. Her style is often likened to the timeless writing of Carole King, Billy Joel and Sara Bareilles, and has caught the attention of other musicians like John Mayer, HER and Jon Batiste. Before releasing her own material, Evans tried it all, from playing standards on cruise ships, gigging at theme parks, accompanying dinner patrons at restaurants and majoring in theater. 

The writing of her debut EP, set to release in 2026, began during a five-month stint living with friends in North Carolina in 2021 and continues into present day life playing piano bars in New York City. The project observes how things have changed; she notices the places that no longer feel like home and the people that do. As her decisions begin to feel more permanent, she explores what it means to love honestly and pulls from moments that serve as examples of love at its best.