“dumbass’ started with one line: “Your fear of looking stupid is holding you back.”

It’s hard to believe that a 15-year-old artist who, at age 9, would sing to anyone and everyone who would listen (and many who wouldn’t) at boutiques, farmers’ markets, and any public gathering, would have the insight to create an entire song around this line. But GAYLE, who moved to Nashville at 12 and immediately became immersed in the city’s legendary songwriting scene, kept hearing that she needed to dig deeper and to make her songs more personal — that THAT was the way to connect with listeners.

“Cut the crap, stop being scared, and be vulnerable,” she remembers as her marching orders in songwriting sessions. And the result is a collection of honest, uninhibited songs that connect with and speak to listeners on a profound, sometimes uncomfortable, level.

“When I put my part of my soul in a song and someone allows it to reach theirs, the goal is for us to have soul sex — it’s intimate, vulnerable, and true.”