I Don't Know How But They Found Me

From the very beginning, fans have fallen in love with Jensen McRae for thesharp, evocative and clear-eyed songwriting. McRae songwriting is vulnerable,yes, but it's also powerful for not holding back. Now, I Don't Know How ButThey Found Me! Delivers McRae's evolution from a promising young artist to abona fide songwriter and star. "The most profound choices of my life," saysMcRae, "have often felt like things I did before I was ready to do, and I had togrow into them." I Don't Know How But They Found Me! #is about what followswhen you have withstood what you thought might crush you. It's aboutmeeting your limits and learning what you're capable of. "I connected withthe idea that I could've easily collapsed beneath the weight of what happenedto me, but I didn't. I didn't even know it," she says, "but I was bulletproof thewhole time."Born and raised in LA, Jensen McRae has studied and made music for most ofher life. She attended Grammy Camp in high school and graduated from USC'sThornton School of Music with a degree in Popular Music. McRae's debutalbum, Are You Happy Now?, was written mostly when she was just 21, and wasthe first step in developing her now-devoted fanbase. Are You Happy Now?navigates identity from it's deepest foundations - life as a young, bi-racial Blackand Jewish woman - to it's most personal musings - do I trust you, do I trustmyself. McRae's trust in herself has borne out on multiple occasions, mostrecently and maybe most famously in the form of "Massachusetts". McRaeposted a solo verse and chorus, little more than a piece of a demo, and itcaught fire online. Covers, duets, and an avalanche of new fans followed, andMcRae capped the moment with a finished version and a summerlong toursupporting Noah Kahan.I Don't Know How but They Found Me! Takes McRae's now-considerablepowers and hardwires them for mass appeal. Stealth single "Savannah" is onefor the yearners. The pulsing, country-adjacent song immediately brings thebest of Phoebe Bridgers to mind, with McRae singing in an acrobatic whisperover 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 layerswith guitar and McRae delivers a series of scathing indictments with grit andconviction: "You swore you'd raise our kids to end up just like you / well you're afalse prophet / and that's a goddamn promise." Meanwhile "Let Me Be Wrong"is a bona fide anthem, a "buoyant ode to rejecting perfectionism." Built onceagain on a simple vocal and acoustic guitar, "Let Me Be Wrong" builds stepover step in it's defiance; guitars layer, drums pick up the pace, and McRaemakes space for everyone's mistakes. When McRae growls "fuck those girls goteverything" it's a punch of both power and vulnerability, begging to beshouted in unison the biggest possible crowd.The unusual title of her second album is taken from a line in McRae's favoritefilm, Back to the Future. A key protagonist survives a hail of bullets, and theimage resonated with McRae because, she said, she often feels a connectionto some future self guiding her decisions, especially in times of crisis. It alsoinspired the album's cover, as McRae stands in a custom fireman's coat withthe job's official marks and symbols stitched alongside abundant ones of herown. The effect caught her off-guard; "I was surprised how emotional it mademe to be in the fire coat," she says, "forced to stand still, stand powerfully. Icould feel myself becoming a symbol of my own hero's journey." If Are YouHappy Now? was her coming of age, I Don't Know How But They Found Me! #isJensen McRae all grown up.