New album from Tess Majors, ‘The Voice Memos,’ earns praise from Rolling Stone

A new album from late Waynesboro and Charlottesville native Tess Majors is earning praise from Rolling Stone, which compares “The Voice Memos” to similar works from Olivia Rodrigo, Soccer Mommy, Billie Eilish and Phoebe Bridgers.

“Her songwriting ability was her biggest strength, and her vocal melodies are the stars of ‘The Voice Memos,’” Cheyenne Roundtree and Kory Grow wrote in their review of the album from Majors, a former Augusta Free Press intern who was murdered in New York City in 2019.

“Just a guitar and piano supporting her vocal melodies, each track had the potential to become something wonderful if she had gotten the time to finish them,” the review continued.

Majors, a 2019 St. Anne’s-Belfield School graduate, worked on songs included in “The Voice Memos” in her time in high school and her freshman year at Barnard College in New York City.

In an interview she gave with a college arts magazine a month before her passing, she said, “I have a lot of songs that haven’t been recorded or put out anywhere.”

She had been looking forward to getting into the studio when she was home over the Christmas break.

The songs she mentioned were eventually found by her parents in the voice memos on her phone. Working off of 170 files recorded over three years, her father, novelist Inman Majors, and producer Brian Pulito compiled “The Voice Memos,” an intimate look into Tess’ creative process.

Mastered by multi-Grammy Award-winning audio engineer Darcy Proper, the project features 14 original songs in their untouched organic state.

The vast majority of the songs are very rough demos and depict a musician crafting her art; working through a melody or trying out different time signatures and chords. The mic is sometimes very close to her or far away, there’s a whisper of a lyric or a slightly out-of-tune guitar.

The songs capture a young artist navigating love, heartbreak, and relationships.

“Every song I write,” Tess Majors said, “usually starts out as an unresolved question I have. Something that’s lingering in my mind that’s bothering me usually and these songs become a way for me to answer those questions.”

“The Voice Memos” release honors two landmarks that Majors was due to achieve in May of 2023: her 22nd birthday and her graduation from college.

The family hopes the project inspires others to release their own original music, discover Tess’ work, and perhaps consider recording their own versions of her songs.

To learn more, visit www.TessMajors.com.