Known for her prowess as a songwriter and tradition bearer who performs with “the skill of a folk-circuit veteran” (Rolling Stone), Grenadian-Canadian artist Kaia Kater took a decidedly different direction for her new album, Grenades, out October 26th. What started out as a search to discover the roots of her identity became a physical and emotional exploration of history, in particular her paternal ancestry, and has led to bold new heights of imagination and creative expression.

Her father Deno grew up in Grenada, fleeing to Canada in 1986 as part of a young speakers program, after the U.S. invasion. His voice can be heard recounting those events during the album's interludes — a way for the Canadian songwriter to tie her present with his past, in order to understand our current global climate of war, unease, immigration, and displacement.

To fully immerse herself in the story, Kater traveled to her father's homeland — her first visit as an adult. “Going home to Grenada felt like shining a light into a part of myself previously shadowed,” she says. She hoped to find the answers to a lifetime’s worth of questions: questions which found their way into these songs as she considered “the legacy of lineage and of fractured family trees." Grenades tells stories of courage and uncertainty; it is an odyssey reflecting on the nature of personal identity, memory, and family— and how sometimes a person must travel across the world to find out where their home is.

Catch Kaia on tour: