i used to think i could fly

“Growing up is chaotic,” Tate McRae sings on her debut album—and that’s especially true when you’ve logged a Top 10 single in multiple countries and racked up over a billion streams before you’ve graduated from high school. After her devastating 2020 ballad “you broke me first” transformed the former aspiring dancer into Billie Eilish’s honorary Canadian cousin, McRae spends much of her debut album offering us reassurances that success hasn’t changed her—in that she still feels as confused, anxious and messed up as any other 18-year-old. That sense of turmoil is baked right into the album title: i used to think i could fly, a phrase that, for McRae, signifies the loss of innocence and idealism that occurs on the journey to adulthood. “When you're younger, everything seems completely possible,” McRae tells Apple Music. “You wouldn't assume that heights are scary, because no one's told you what they're scared of. No one's left a mark on you yet. I’ve always been interested with the idea of how life makes a mark on you as you get older, and how the people you surround yourself with shape you as a person.” In McRae’s case, those transformative and traumatic moments often play out in the context of toxic relationships plagued by substance abuse, infidelity and gaslighting. The singer has a forensic eye for those subtle turning-point moments in a partnership—like a boyfriend forgetting to wish her good night for the first time—that spell inevitable doom. But while i used to think i could fly is built upon McRae’s familiar foundation of aching acoustic melodies and atmospheric trap-infused R&B production, the album also uncorks a pop-punk energy that breaks up the pity party. “I didn't want this album to feel like a sulk-for-me album,” McRae says. “I wanted people to have moments where they could cry and feel like they could relate, but I also want them to feel like 'I'm a bad bitch' at the same time. I just wanted to cross off all aspects of my brain.” Here, McRae talks