Katie Pruitt charts a course for self-compassion on ‘Mantras’

The road to a follow-up album for singer-songwriter Katie Pruitt was a long one.

We first met the Georgia-born singer-songwriter in 2020, when she stopped by World Cafe to play songs from her debut album, Expectations. It explored Katie’s life as a queer Americana artist growing up in the South, working to be fully embraced by her Catholic family.

A lot has changed in those last four years. After so much time spent seeking understanding from the world around her, Pruitt turned inward. She’s just released her sophomore album, called Mantras. She calls it a “full-circle journey from self-sabotage to self-compassion.”

In this session, Pruitt talks about the process of turning self-doubt into empathy for herself; and how her relationship with her parents changed in the aftermath of her debut.

This episode of World Cafe was produced and edited by Miguel Perez. Our senior producer is Kimberly Junod and our engineer is Chris Williams. Our programming and booking coordinator is Chelsea Johnson and our line producer is Will Loftus.