ALBUM REVIEW: On ‘Mantras,’ Katie Pruitt Learns to Look for the Silver Linings
Maeri Ferguson
Posted On April 2, 2024
You are your own worst critic, so the saying goes. It’s a near universal truth of humanity that it’s far easier to see all the bad than any of the good in moments of self-reflection. Nashville-based singer-songwriter Katie Pruitt started digging into this juicy stuff on her acclaimed 2019 debut Expectations (ND story) and continued to mine it in conversations with a wide-ranging series of guests on her Recovering Catholic podcast (ND story) in the years since. Now, on her sophomore album, Mantras, she’s exploring what happens when you realize the call for negativity is coming from inside the house and decide to show it the door. With her soulful powerhouse of a voice, Pruitt is doing her damnedest to channel kindness and forgiveness, even as she grapples with all the muck she had to crawl through to get to it.
As she did on Expectations, with Mantras Pruitt goes deep on the chokehold that politics has on organized religion and her own background as a queer person coming of age amid its hostile confines. But she finds little ways to line these dark narratives in gleaming silver rings of hope, like on opening track “All My Friends.” Set to rollicking guitars and a driving pop melody, Pruitt looks at the post-religion path of exploration that branches out in a million directions. “Everybody’s hooked on something / second chances or a second coming,” she sings, before belting “A new mantra every other week / All my friends are finding new beliefs.” The similarly toned gorgeous and explosive “White Lies, White Jesus and You” is Pruitt at her vocal peak, questioning the harmful weaponization of faith.
But Mantras is mainly focused on Pruitt turning inward to get out of her own head. Standouts like “Self Sabotage” and “Worst Case Scenario,” with Pruitt’s prettiest harmonies, find her reaching for a positive outlook despite her habitual inclination to assume otherwise. “Blood Related” looks at overcoming inherited anxieties and finding common ground, and on the string-laden “Phases of the Moon” she tries her best to roll with whatever inevitable changes come her way. Pruitt may still be contemplating the big stuff — identity, faith, self-compassion — but with Mantras, the progress is in the pudding.
Katie Pruitt’s Mantras is out April 5 on Rounder Records.
