Alexandra Kay released her debut album, All I’ve Ever Known, on Thursday (Oct. 26). The project gives fans a glimpse into the heart of the fast-rising songstress, detailing the “entire story” of her divorce from start to finish through the lyrics of the 11 tracks.

Serving as a writer on each and every song, the album is truly as authentic as it gets.

In an exclusive interview with Music Mayhem, Kay opened up about the meaning behind her debut project, sharing the gut-wrenching stories behind All I’ve Ever Known as a whole. Read our full interview with the viral hitmaker below.

All I’ve Ever Known

Describing her debut project as a diary, All I’ve Ever Known is truly Alexandra Kay and her life experiences in a nutshell.

“I started writing when I was 13 years old, and it was really only because I didn’t have any other outlet for all of my feelings,” she prefaced. “I was just, you know, a teenager or a preteen that was going into a new school and trying to make friends and having my first crush for the first time and like experiencing all these things and I didn’t know how to process them, so I started writing… I’m still doing that, you know, 20 years later.”

Alexandra Kay 'All I've Ever Known' Album Art
Alexandra Kay ‘All I’ve Ever Known’ Album Art

While writing for All I’ve Ever Known was extremely reminiscent of her early days as a singer-songwriter, this project captured a time in her life that no woman ever wants to go through: a divorce.

“I’m going through a divorce from my ex who I was with for a decade,” Kay revealed, ultimately laying her heart out on the line.

“I pretty much just became 13 again. The only way that I knew how to process this extreme loss in my life and the grief that I was feeling was to write about it, and that’s exactly what I did, and so I’ve always been vulnerable in my music, but this is by far the most I think raw and real and unapologetic I’ve been when it comes to writing,” Kay dished, before diving into the process of opening up her heart to create All I’ve Ever Known.

Opening Up about her divorce

Given that this body of work is as vulnerable as it can be, it was really scary for Alexandra Kay to release her feelings and emotions for the world to hear, almost instantaneously receiving backlash after posting a few teasers on social media.

“I just started sharing songs from the album like on social media, and of course, I’ve completely opened myself up, because this is something that I’ve been going through for over a year now and people are just hearing about it for the first time… I think when they started not seeing him anymore and they started realizing like the scenery change, everybody started to catch on a little bit,” Kay explained.

Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Daniel Shippey
Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Daniel Shippey

“I Just Told My Story”

While Alexandra Kay fans may have caught on to the fact that a breakup was occurring, she did not share much about this difficult time in her life in any way besides what she knows best: music.

“Now, as I’m releasing all of these things, it feels like I’ve healed that wound, and then I just cut it back open,” she revealed, and fans wholeheartedly understand her point of view.

Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau
Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau

“I’m already, you know, gaining scrutiny over the situation just on social media, because everybody has their opinion, but yeah. It’s terrifying, but the process of actually writing the music and opening up was the easiest part of it all, because I just told my story. Everything that I say in this music is truth,” she continued to share with Music Mayhem.

The country star concluded, “There are a lot of songs that are very, very specific to me that I don’t know how they’re going to go over with everybody else, because it was literally just me opening up a diary and just spilling my heart out onto the page and then recording it, so that was the easiest part, but I think the hardest part of it so far is, you know, seeing everybody’s opinions online who don’t know me, who don’t know my ex, who don’t know my situation.”

Regardless of the haters, Kay’s music is certain to help those who may be going through a similar situation, and that is what truly matters.

All I’ve Ever Known Track List

  1. Painted Him Perfect
  2. Everleave
  3. More Than You
  4. Easy
  5. I Hate Airplanes
  6. Happy Once
  7. How Do We Go
  8. Kiss Me Goodnight
  9. All I’ve Ever Known
  10. She Stayed
  11. I Can Do Anything
Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau
Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau

Narrowing down the tracks

Even though every track featured on All I’ve Ever Known is nothing short of spectacular, this selection process did not come easy to the Illinois native.

In order to make sure that her debut project was as representative as possible, Kay made sure that the eleven tracks spanned all of the different emotions she felt while experiencing her divorce, some positive and some negative.

“‘All I’ve Ever Known’ is that initial experience of me kind of laying in bed in my new apartment… Every house that I’ve ever bought was to fit his needs. Every place we’ve ever lived was to fit him, and so ‘All I’ve Ever Known’ is that realization of coming into my own,” she explained, sharing the meaning behind the title track of the project.

“Then you have ‘Kiss Me Goodnight,’ which is hearing about someone in your life moving on and being like, ‘How could you do this so fast?’ and then ‘Painted Him Perfect’ is really what kicks off the entire album, and that’s the letter to my fans,” the rising country star shared, referencing two more soon-to-be-hit songs from the album.

She concluded with a grin, “I wrote through every different new emotion and new experience I’ve experienced over the last year and a half, and then we just created eleven songs out of it.”

Most Meaningful Songs On The Project: “Everleave” And “All I’ve Ever Known”

While all eleven tracks on All I’ve Ever Known are absolutely exceptional, detailing all different facets of her divorce, Kay has pinpointed two as being the most meaningful to her: “Everleave” and “All I’ve Ever Known.”

“I would say the most meaningful song to me, it goes back and forth between ‘Everleave’ and ‘All I’ve Ever Known,’ but probably ‘Everleave,’ because ‘Everleave’ kind of goes back into the past instead of living in the future, where ‘All I’ve Ever Known’ is where I am now,” the emerging artist prefaced, before diving into the story behind the song itself.

“It is a journey through feeling unloved in your relationship, feeling unwanted, feeling unappreciated and staying because you love that person, and then every day wondering when you’re going to break,” she explained, prior to diving into the gut-wrenching lyrics.

Kay sings leading up to the chorus, “Standing at the kitchen sink / I wonder if you’ll ask about my day / I’m washing off your dinner plate / And all I see’s a decade down the drain / And you’ve got no idea I’m drowning / Mind is racing, heart is pounding / Is today the day I walk away?”

These lyrics have a special significance to the talented singer/songwriter, revealing to Music Mayhem that this is how she felt every day leading up to the divorce.

“When I was recording that, I pictured myself in that position, because I had been there so many times,” she spilled. “I think that that’s the most special song, because I really wonder if I would have stayed as long, if I would’ve had that song to listen to, you know?”

Alexandra Kay concluded with a grin, “I think it’s going to help a lot of women feeling the same.”

Overall takeaways from All I’ve Ever Known

Fortunately, “Everleave” is not the only song that will undoubtedly help those who are struggling.

In fact, Kay revealed that the entirety of All I’ve Ever Known is meant to help individuals with “whatever they need,” regardless of what they are going through.

“I kind of put my music out there as therapy for myself and as a coping mechanism for myself and to help and heal myself, but I want people to pick it apart,” the soon-to-be country star dished. “I want them to take whatever they need [and] I want it to just be a toolbox, and you just take whatever you need in order to fix yourself, and you can deconstruct my songs and you can make them mean something that they don’t actually mean because it relates to you.”

Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau
Alexandra Kay; Photo Courtesy of Steph Siau

She concluded passionately, “That’s what I want you to do. If not, then this is just heartache and it’s just tragedy, and I can’t accept that, and so I have to make something beautiful for everybody to be able to kind of take a piece of it and heal themselves, and so that’s exactly what I want everybody to do.”

The project skyrocketed up the charts upon release and debuted at No. 1 on the iTunes Country chart and No. 4 on the all-genre iTunes Album chart.

All I’ve Ever Known is available now everywhere.

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Originally from Southern California and currently residing in Music City, Melanie graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a BA in Journalism before beginning her career as a music and entertainment journalist. Beginning to write for Music Mayhem in August of 2023, she has also contributed to Holler, Country Now, Country Chord, Celeb Secrets, Celeb Secrets Country, We Got This Covered and Decider throughout her career thus far. When she is not writing, Melanie enjoys going to concerts and music festivals, binging her favorite television shows, spending time with her friends and family and cheering on the Oklahoma Sooners (of course).

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