In Birmingham’s independent music scene, authenticity still matters — and Rebecca Egeland has built her music around exactly that. Her songs are not manufactured stories or carefully polished fiction. They are lived experiences: grief, joy, longing, healing, memory, and the quiet work of learning how to keep going.
Ahead of the July 10 release of her new six-song EP, Fine is a Figment, Egeland describes songwriting less as performance or work and more as emotional processing. “Almost all of my songs are true things that have happened in my life or feelings that I’ve had,” she says. “I’m not sure how to write about things I haven’t experienced.”
Music has followed Egeland since childhood. Raised in Birmingham, she grew up singing church hymns with both of her grandmothers and listening to Billy Joel in the car with her mother. Her first concert was a sold-out Billy Joel show at the BJCC — a formative memory for a young girl.
But the true beginning of her artistic voice came during one of the hardest periods of her life. After receiving a ukulele for Christmas during her sophomore year at UAB, Egeland’s mother passed away just weeks later, in January 2013. Suddenly unable to articulate her grief in ordinary conversation, she turned inward and began writing songs.
“A lot of what the music started as initially was processing grief and loss,” she says. “Living with what is now and not what used to be.”
That emotional honesty still anchors her work more than a decade later. While her music has expanded beyond what she calls her “mom songs,” themes of healing, memory, and resilience continue to thread through her catalog. Her upcoming EP explores those ideas through what Egeland calls different “sound worlds” — atmospheric, textured songs tied together by her unmistakably intimate writing style.
The project’s title, Fine is a Figment, emerged after she noticed how often the idea of being “fine” appeared throughout her work. “Sometimes you say you’re fine when you’re not actually fine,” she says. “So what even is fine?”
Recorded at Boutwell Studios with producer Brad Lyons, the EP moves beyond the stripped-down acoustic recordings Egeland first released in 2018. Together, the pair carefully crafted sonic textures that match the emotional nuance of the songs.
That attention to emotional atmosphere extends beyond the music itself. The EP artwork, photographed by Birmingham photographer Liesa Cole, uses soft lavenders and blues — colors Egeland says reflect both heaviness and hope. Many images were shot inside her downtown Birmingham home. “Sharing songs feels like giving away pieces of yourself,” she says. “So I might as well welcome you into my home.”
Though deeply personal, Egeland’s music ultimately centers on connection. Whether she’s playing intimate songwriter rounds, teaching dance fitness classes at the Mountain Brook YMCA, or organizing community-driven music spaces around Birmingham, her work consistently returns to the same belief: community matters.
“Life is about community,” she says. “You’ve got to connect to people to build communities.”
Rebecca Egeland’s EP Fine is a Figment releases July 10, with a release show scheduled for July 12 at The Upstairs at Avondale Brewing Company. While you can stream Egeland’s body of work on all streaming platforms, nothing can compare to the in-person experience. We’ll see you there.