Rocking With Jam Man talks with MacKenzie Grant
Rocking With Jam Man talks with MacKenzie Grant about her new single “Putting Down Some Things,” after a 15 year break, why now was the time to return to music, her upcoming album Wonder World, covering Joni Mitchell, her touring plans and what is next for her
Nashville-based singer, songwriter and classically trained pianist MACKENZIE GRANT has returned to music after a 15-year break with the upcoming release of her sophomore full-length album WONDER WORLD due March 18 via BlackBird Record Label. Produced and engineered by Phil Dubnick, the album was inspired by GRANT’s time away from music working as a school counserlor in a high-poverty and high-trauma preschool covering themes suchs as self-reckoning, feminine empowerment and overcoming negative mindsets.
WONDER WORLD features songs written by MACKENZIE plus a cover of Joni Mitchell’s “Borderline.” The album’s first single is “Putting Down Some Things,” the video for which was premiered yesterday by Americana Highways. Beautifully written and sung by MACKENZIE, the song is a moving and infectious country song about self-renewal which Americana Highways praised, stating that “Grant’s songwriting is informed by witnessing a wave of these elements of the human experience, and the gentle easiness of her vocals helps to soothe the soul.” Watch the music video streaming below or HERE.
“Putting Down Some Things” will be released digitally this Friday, January 7 and can be pre-saved at this link: https://linktr.ee/mackenziegrantmusic.
“As a former counselor, I worked with children affected by poverty, marginalization, domestic violence, generational trauma–all things that were not their fault or theirs to carry as innocents,” shares GRANT. “I tried to foster resilience and self-compassion in them. When I took a break from this work, I found I was crippled by many of the mindsets they lived with on a daily basis: shame, self-blame, fear, criticism, etc. I knew I had to give the same allowance and self-compassion to myself that I had encouraged in them.”
She continues to share the meaning behind the track, stating that “‘Putting Down Some Things’ is born of the idea that the way so many of us treat ourselves, the mental self-degradation, is ultimately just our brain trying to stay safe and protected. But that’s the big lie; that we have to beat ourselves up in order to find motivation and growth. I had to start putting down that self-criticism because it no longer worked. We’re all connected in our suffering and with the events of the past couple of years, we’ve experienced it exponentially. But for most of us it’s our own inner voice doing the most damage. It’s accepting ourselves and giving our suffering compassion that is needed to heal us, individually and collectively.”
As a naturally gifted musician, GRANT has been writing and singing for as long as she can remember. A native of Syracuse, New York, and the daughter of two classically trained musicians, she effortlessly blends the clarity of her singing voice with the raw emotion in her lyrics. After three years at the University of Michigan, she transferred to Berklee in Boston, where she received positive feedback on her songwriting from her professors and peers alike. GRANT relocated to Nashville in 2000 after visiting the city with friends on spring break and discovering that it immediately felt like home.
Just before moving, she’d made an independent album that attracted the attention of a hit songwriter in Nashville, who invited her to write and record together if she ever came to town. That connection helped open the doors to the city’s songwriting community, as she developed an audience through playing writers rounds and releasing the 2006 album, The Laundry Room Glamour Hour. Around this same time, she also married and started a family, but gradually she became disillusioned with the music industry and her first marriage ended.
Now remarried and raising three children (a high schooler, a middle schooler, and a preschooler), she is once again using music as a way to connect with others and herself.
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