| Article number: | DEDO365C1.1 |
I Don't Know How but They Found Me! Takes McRae's now-considerable powers and hardwires them for mass appeal. Stealth single "Savannah" is one for the yearners. The pulsing, country-adjacent song immediately brings the best of Phoebe Bridgers to mind, with McRae singing in an acrobatic whisper over a feather light acoustic guitar. By the time "Savannah" hits it's crescendo, it's crystal clear McRae is an artist with her own singular power, as piano layers with guitar and McRae delivers a series of scathing indictments 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." Meanwhile "Let Me Be Wrong" is a bona fide anthem, a "buoyant ode to rejecting perfectionism." Built once again on a simple vocal and acoustic guitar, "Let Me Be Wrong" builds step over step in it's defiance; guitars layer, drums pick up the pace, and McRae makes space for everyone's mistakes. When McRae growls "f*** those girls got everything" it's a punch of both power and vulnerability, begging to be shouted in unison the biggest possible crowd. The unusual title of her second album is taken from a line in McRae's favorite film, Back to the Future. A key protagonist survives a hail of bullets, and the image resonated with McRae because, she said, she often feels a connection to some future self guiding her decisions, especially in times of crisis. It also inspired the album's cover, as McRae stands in a custom fireman's coat with the job's official marks and symbols stitched alongside abundant ones of her own. The effect caught her off-guard; "I was surprised how emotional it made me to be in the fire coat," she says, "forced to stand still, stand powerfully. I could feel myself becoming a symbol of my own hero's journey." If Are You Happy Now? was her coming of age, I Don't Know How But They Found Me! #is Jensen McRae all grown up.
TracksCredits
1 The Rearranger
2 I Can Change Him
3 Savannah
4 Daffodils
5 Let Me Be Wrong
6 Novelty
7 I Don't Do Drugs
8 Tuesday
9 Mother Wound
10 Praying for Your Downfall
11 Massachusetts
