‘Fueled By Ma’ Marks Singer/Songwriter’s Expansion, Adding Energy to Heartfelt Tunes

Ma’s March 2025 single “Gaza Sunset,” opens with plaintive coils of guitar, joined by vocals that surge like wind over water. The song’s impressionist lyrics bear a message of empowerment: “It may be dark/ But there is hope/ Although it’s hard to see/ If we’re united we can cope/ And soon we’ll all be free…”

As Ma, Chris Vercauteren crafts catchy yet haunting folk-inflected tunes that showcase his rich, timeless voice, which invokes the breathy, blues-inflected tone of John Mayer and the range, timber and emotional depth of Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens).

“Gaza Sunset” is just one of a cache of songs Ma has recorded and performed as a solo artist. Drawing on R&B, country and indie folk, he initially dropped a set of four acoustic demos on Bandcamp, including the swaying soulful “The Abyss,” where he seems to channel the rangy gospel tenor of Sam Cooke. There’s steely resolve encased in the tune’s soaring melody and Ma’s delivery, like a live electric wire sparking just below the surface:

“This is where I want to be/ When this all comes crumbling down/ Knowing our ways we’ll be dead without a doubt/ But I’ll still love…”

Ma’s debut solo EP Ghost dropped in May 2025 and a full-length live acoustic album, Ma – Live at The Evening Muse, followed in August. The Charlotte singer-songwriter’s gig at Petra’s on Jan. 30 marks the release of Ma’s latest EP, Fueled by Ma, the artist’s first project since expanding Ma from a solo venture into a three-piece indie-rock band.

The EP’s six songs have all been released before — four of them are reworkings of Ma’s Bandcamp demos — here reimagined and invigorated by a guitar, bass and drums.

“[Fueled by Ma] is much louder, higher energy, punchier and way more dynamic,” says Ma, who still goes by his moniker despite expanding the project to three members. “It’s the same songs, but totally different.”

Ma’s family is Vietnamese-American; his mother Susan grew up in the South Vietnamese city of Hue before migrating south to Saigon. She left her home country with the fall of its capital city in 1975.

Growing up, Vercauteren’s reality was shaped by his mixed-race, part immigrant family, and its embrace of middle American capitalist values. He was able to fit into both worlds, middle-class America and the Vietnamese-American community.

“I’ve lived in-between my entire life; it was inevitable that it would inform my art,” he offers.

At age 13, he convinced his dad to buy him a guitar and quickly learned to play Green Day’s entire American Idiot album from start to finish. While attending Charlotte Catholic High School, he formed a pop-punk band called The Fallback, in which he first took the mic as a singer. A second, more pop-oriented high school band named North 51 followed.

Attending UNC-Chapel Hill, where he majored in economics, Vercauteren formed the Rage Against the Machine-meets-reggae collective Of Thieves and Fiends as an antidote to “the pop bullshit” he had played for two years prior. The Trap House Band, a party-music combo that played fraternity houses and breweries, came next. The gigs paid handsomely and made the prospect of making music financially feasible.

Returning to Charlotte after graduating in 2015, Vercauteren pursued a career in the finance field by day. At night, he played as solo singer-songwriter Spakman before joining genre-blending indie-rock trio The Mongos. After that, he went solo again.

Ma cultivates the ghost inside

In October 2024, Vercauteren attended the Find Your Muse open mic at The Evening Muse after a seven-year hiatus and wanted to use a moniker that wasn’t his legal name.

“I had just learned that ‘ma’ means ghost in Vietnamese,” he remembers. “I liked the idea of being an observer as opposed to someone that took up a lot of space. Ghosts silently observe. They bear witness to reality.”

The open mic gig marked a turning point in his life. He had just quit his corporate job of nine years and was beginning to truly see the world around him, he insists.

Looking back at his early acoustic efforts, Ma says he realizes now that he was subconsciously grappling with the life changes he would soon embrace. Without realizing it, he was preparing himself to grieve for all he would leave behind, which included his corporate career.

This spiritual/psychological sea change also coincided with a growing political awareness, addressed in songs like “Gaza Sunset.”

He remembers being galvanized by the Israeli genocide in Gaza, which has been justified as a response to Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack that killed 1,195 Israelis and foreign nationals. Since then, Israeli forces have killed 71,439 Palestinians and injured 171,324, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza. The violence has been exacerbated by Israeli-caused famine in Gaza.

“We were in the midst of having genocide being live-streamed to our phones, yet it was portrayed as something entirely different in the Western media,” Ma says. “It triggered something in my brain.”

After that, he undertook what he calls a quest to examine the information passed onto us by systems like corporate media. As he investigated what was presented as reality and truth, he determined to leave his finance job, which he felt was contributing to systems that distort reality. Once sparked, Ma’s journey has never stopped.

Through his songwriting, Ma also realized that his subconscious was preparing to let go of relationships he was outgrowing. One was a long-term relationship he has since ended, as is documented in the song “Dreamweaver” on the politically charged Gaza Sunset EP.

“I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a breakup song — before the breakup happened,” he says.

Ma expands to an indie-rock trio

In November 2024, Ma and singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Timothy Chandler Hicks were both at a Find Your Muse with singer-songwriter Emily June, known for her delicate, folk-inflected tunes. The musicians had all met before, with and Chandler Hicks opening shows for each other.

This meeting, however, led to all three playing together in June’s band — Chandler Hicks on drums, banjo and backing vocals with Ma on bass. Playing in that group, Ma met June’s lead guitarist, Brett Ennis, who also does producing work for June.

By summer 2025, Ma had formed a trio with himself on vocals and guitar, Chandler Hicks on drums and Ennis on bass.

Playing with the band has brought out his soulful side, allowing him to draw on inspirations like Marvin Gaye and Etta James as well as indie rockers like The Black Keys. He says the songs the trio has re-recorded may draw from a tradition of protest music that spawned artists like Bob Dylan, but other elements are in the mix.

“These songs are politically activated, but they’re also a representation of all of the musical influences on my life,” he says. “Why can’t I sing songs about this material, but as an indie-rock guy, or a soul guy?”

When it came time to record Ma’s debut EP, it was assembled the indie-rock way: pieced together on a time crunch.

“I recorded all of the guitars and vocals in my living room,” Ma says. “[Then] I went to Timothy’s house with a cheap microphone and a laptop and we recorded his drum parts in his basement. Brett recorded the bass parts on his own and shot those over.”

Every part was played in a continuous take all the way through.

“It’s impossible to escape the humanity of it,” Ma says. “There are all kinds of imperfections on this record. I love how much it breathes.”

“The music Ma writes and performs — the approach is very simple, it’s very direct,” Ennis says. “The songs are incredible and there’s no fluff to them.”

Read more: Ali Forrest Lands a Knockout with ‘Cagefighter’ (2025)

In person as well as on record, the singer/songwriter’s empathy shines through, says Chandler Hicks. It’s a quality that makes him a great musical and artistic collaborator.

“Ma is willing to work with anyone, give and take feedback without ego, and put the final outcome of the work above all else,” Chandler Hicks says.

“Ma is a very honest and genuine person,” Ennis says. “I have never seen him go to a live performance and not approach the person who was performing and give them an incredible, heartfelt compliment. He always has something so kind to say.”

Ma expands upon a tradition of heartfelt songwriting where the political, personal and communal are intertwined. He’s crafting a growing body of work where community commitment and personal mindfulness, conscious observation and subconscious understanding, are kept in balance.

“As a ghost, you can see the truth,” he says. “You see the light through the trees.”

A ghost also observes from every angle. It’s the discerning witness we need now more than ever.