How Atlanta gave musician Makenna Lyric the confidence to create

The Montana native found the creative company and self-discovery needed to write, record and release her first fully self-produced album.

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Folk music, in its simplest iteration, is the great connector. It is the red string theory of music history, connecting the self to the collective, the successor to the ancestor and the intimate to the universal. In every lifetime, it has been the accessible ambassador of aural tradition. In this lifetime, 23-year-old producer and singer-songwriter Makenna Lyric is among a growing number of young artists finding themselves within the current folk revival, with a particular emphasis on its legacy of exploring Black and lesbian identity. 

Born in the mountain-dimpled town of Missoula, Montana, Lyric arrived in Atlanta in 2020 to pursue a degree in social work and a sense of musical community.

“Although my hometown is very walkable, queer and naturesque, it’s .7% Black — .5% when I lived there. The lack of community was suffocating and ostracizing. I knew I wouldn’t be able to bloom until I left.” 

And bloom she did. Those formative first few years in Atlanta gave Lyric the creative company and self-discovery needed to write, record and release her first fully self-produced album, Leap!, in 2024.

Like leading a trusted friend to that creekside alcove you deem your “I know a spot” spot, Leap! is as transportive to a parallel world as it is firmly rooted in the surroundings of her early 20s. Ambient field recordings conjure images of green, thicketed trails just as easily assignable to Missoula as they are to Atlanta. Softly twanged arpeggios go skittering across like pond skaters in rich stereo. Lyric grew up in two households, with one feeding her a steady stream of Mary J. Blige and Deniece Williams and the other a folk-heavy sustenance of Tracy Chapman. Such studies are evident in the record’s lush acoustic layering, which leaves space for her voice to move in soul-trained arias that circle the question of whether she’s ready to be loved fully and without pretense.

“Realizing my lesbian identity was the catalyst for my debut album release,” Lyric says. “This includes ending a previous relationship, sitting with guilt and confusion and experiencing a lesbian relationship for the first time. My sexuality not only affects who I decide to be with romantically; it affects the way I see the world, the way I analyze male centeredness and the way I build community. My music is a tangible part of my experiences, mind, and soul, so if queer is what I am, then my music reflects that.” 

Lyric’s first few years in Atlanta also gave her the crucial nudge to commit fully to self-production. 

Early experiments with composing were recorded in her room with Apple headphones, straight into the GarageBand app. Production was often outsourced.

 “I believed that somebody else’s ear could bring my idea to fruition better than I could,” she says. “That came from a lack of fem producer representation in the industry.”

A 2025 report from the USC Annenberg Inclusion Initiative analyzed 1,300 songs from the Billboard Hot 100 year-end charts spanning 2012 to 2024. It found that in 2024, women held just 5.9% of production credits. Of those 14 women producers, only two were women of color.

Lyric recalls a moment from a recording studio she used to frequent in Missoula, one run entirely by men: “One of them said something to me along the lines of, ‘You’re like a rusty Chevy that we get to fix up.’ I remember thinking: I never want to be seen that way in terms of my musical creation ever again.”

Since then, she’s found collaborators who affirm her vision. Working with producer and artist lucidluc helped her push past imposter syndrome. Mixing vocals for Christelle Bofale on their joint track “Fish Ponds” further solidified her confidence. “That moment made me realize there was no reason not to take full rein of my creativity.”

The confidence to steer this creativity doesn’t diffuse exclusively from direct collaboration either. Lyric feels particularly inspired by Atlanta’s many rock-forward DIY bands. “It’s a genre that I’ve dipped my toe into, and it’s great to see alternative Black artists have such an influence on the underground scene. I think Black artists are so often shoved into the box of rap and R&B, so the fact that Atlanta has such a wide network of Black artists who’ve stepped outside that box is amazing!”

As Lyric slowly works to foster a greater ambient and folk scene, she must also juggle many of the (unpaid) aspects that come with being an indie artist. One of the biggest challenges she faces is staying connected to the music when the click economy threatens to flatten it.

“You need to market yourself as a business rather than a person, and this can strip you of the authenticity that you need to be a musical artist,” she says. “I wish I could just drop songs whenever I wanted without thinking about how they’ll be perceived, but that’s not where we are.”

Still, Lyric tugs herself forward by the inevitable thread connecting her present to past and her past to future. Her next album is already in motion and features guest appearances and a broader range of instrumentation.

“The theme is circling back to yourself,” she says. “It feels more honest and raw than my last album and possibly less palatable to the masses. But the goal of creation is authenticity.” 

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Lindsay Thomaston is a photographer and culture writer with a background in media and politics. Her work has appeared in Paste Magazine, Rolling Stone, i-D, Dazed, Fashionista and Immersive Atlanta, among others.