BUICK AUDRA

ADULT CHILD, the fourth album from Nashville-based songwriter/vocalist/guitarist Buick Audra, is a concept record about identity, estrangement, and trying to outrun one’s lineage. The title references a shorthand term Audra has long used to denote her personal background. The nine-track body of work allows listeners into her world of squaring off with self-doubt, wondering if repeating familial patterns is inevitable, and navigating relationships outside of the family structure that mirror familiar dynamics. Of the collection, she says:

“This project comes from two different places. The first, is a set of awarenesses about my tendencies and cycles that are absolutely informed by what I come from, but which I sometimes still perpetuate today. The second, is a desire to own the identities I wear in this life, not to have them defined by other people. Right at the intersection of those two things is this term I’ve been using since I was eighteen years old: adult child. Maybe that term is familiar to you, maybe it isn’t. But in some spaces, those two words tell the person I’m speaking to that I was raised without the typical supports in place, that I have an outsized sense of responsibility, and that I struggle with my self-worth. Worse, if I advocate for my own wellbeing, I might gain a relationship with myself while jeopardizing relationships with others. It’s tricky. This is a record about fighting for myself, often against my own DNA.”

While the project is quite personal, the themes are universal. The album opens with “The Worst People Win,” a track lamenting our culture’s insistence in making “nice guys” of those who injure others; “Questions for the Gods of Human Behavior” sees Audra catching herself doing the very things she doesn’t want done to her, a pattern she wonders if she can break in her lifetime; “Yellow” explores a habit of saying demeaning things about herself in front of other people, a practice formed young in a family that relied on her being the problem in every situation; “One-Step Close-Up” is both a love letter to her trusty Polaroid camera and a declaration of self-regard; “Birthdays & Bullshit” describes a friendship that operates the same way her old family relationships did—one in which Audra matters less than the other person; in “It All Belonged to Me” she speaks candidly about why she hasn’t been home to Miami in a decade, a place she loves and aches for from a distance, but avoids due to estrangement from a parent who still lives there; “Losing My Courage” is a stripped-bare statement of determination from someone who carries PTSD, sensory issues, and stage fright with her on stage—as well as a request to be heard in her experience; “Firstborn” is a breezy but solemn state-of-the-union declaration about what it’s like to be the eldest child in a dysfunctional family; and the record closes with “A List,” a thirty-five second spoken piece about forgetting but not forgiving. The entire record clocks in twenty-eight minutes, but it gives the listener much to think about.

Audra acted as producer and built ADULT CHILD across sessions at two Nashville locations: Sound Emporium Studio A, and her own Fort Knockout Studio. She is joined by Jerry Roe, Lex Price, and Kris Donegan on six of the tracks, and applies a more scaled-back approach on the other three. Kurt Ballou (Converge) mixed the album. Of the music, she says:

“It started small. I had a couple of songs that I wanted to track with the guys in the studio, so I did. And then there were a couple more. Before I knew it, I was painting this portrait of my current self, one chord and soul-bearing truth at a time. And that felt right. So much of my work in recent years has been about telling past stories through a current lens. But this work is about exactly who and what I am right now. And one of the things I am is a rock musician who loves to track vocals. Once the band tracks were done, I kept writing, but I wanted to give those later couple of songs, "Losing My Courage" and "Yellow," more immediacy and intimacy. Less to hide behind. Make it more about my voice and what it feels like to share these parts of myself. I had such a beautiful, powerful time recording this work. I asked Ballou to mix it because he’s been mixing my other projects for over five years now. He knows me, knows my voice. And here we are.”

Following the album's lead as a sonic collage, the artwork was all rendered by Audra using Polaroids, layering techniques, and her own handwriting.

Buick Audra is proud to share ADULT CHILD, a bold and honest collection about what it is to be an estranged firstborn adult child—and ultimately, a human being.

Buick Audra is a Grammy Award-winning musician, songwriter, and producer living in Nashville, TN. She is also the guitarist, vocalist, and primary songwriter in the melodic heavy duo, Friendship Commanders.