Episode 27: How to Turn a Depression Spiral into a Goddess Anthem with Rachel Maxann

Rachel Maxann built her debut album "Black Fae" as a 56-minute expedition through the darkest corners of her mind, then emerged claiming her divinity.

The Memphis-based vocalist and therapist structured the record like a depressive spiral. Not the sanitized kind that gets radio play, but the real thing that starts with intrusive thoughts and burrows deeper until you either learn something profound about yourself or don't come back at all. Her decision to bury "Goddess," the album's most triumphant moment, deep in the tracklist wasn't commercial strategy but psychological honesty: you don't start a spiral feeling invincible. Working as both musician and mental health professional, she channels the same empathy that helps her clients navigate self-doubt into folk songs that reclaim Black space in fantasy narratives, positioning herself as both healer and the healed.

We talk about her mom raising her on bluegrass and older country music before she realized she'd been writing folk all along, how self-doubt and validation seeking show up constantly in her therapy practice with creative clients, performing her second Grizzlies halftime show with an all-girl band, writing songs in Columbia and Ireland that are still sitting in her vault waiting to be fleshed out, her ADHD-fueled instrument collecting habit that led to owning bass, drums and a cajon, how her upcoming album themes are shifting toward hope and activism, her admission that it's easier to fight for others than herself, and her ultimate dream of recording with a symphony and choir in an ancient cathedral or possibly a cave.