“Jay Som has always been based around the comfort of solitude,” , The Oakland resident Melina Duterte has been making music for over 10 years — at 22 years old, essentially half her life and her project reflects self-taught and hard-earned experience, largely learned alone. “Being by myself and making music all the time… That’s where the art is. That’s where I’m the most creative, and that’s where my cathartic process for everything is. It’s what makes me feel 100%.”
As an artist, the natural course of progression tends to expand outward, but Duterte seems intent on doing everything on her own, at least for the foreseeable future. (“It’s not that I don’t ever want to collaborate with anyone. It’s just that, for now, I really like working by myself,” she says.) After putting out a steady stream of under-the-radar releases, and an admittedly hastily-assembled collection of demos and incoherent thoughts spontaneously uploaded to Bandcamp It was reissued by Topshelf Records and then Polyvinyl Records, the latter of which signed her and are releasing what’s billed as her debut full-length.
That album, “Everybody Works”, bears the weight of the trial-and-error that came before it. Recorded entirely by herself in her bedroom last fall after returning from tour, “Everybody Works” is a sparkling testament to Duterte’s skill as both a songwriter and producer. Her self-imposed solitude invites a multiplicity of perspectives — you can sense that in both the variety of sounds explored on the album (no two songs sound alike) and in its lyrics, which focus on the emotional labour that we put into our relationships with others. Jay Som’s music is in constant conversation with itself, playing out imagined situations and precarious interpersonal give-and-takes with the pressure of reality looming behind.
“Baybee,” the album’s third single with a video directed by Charlotte Hornsby and Jesse Ruuttila), is a great example of the way in which Duterte maps out the inner workings of her mind to tangible results. “If I leave you alone when you don’t feel right, I know we’ll sink for sure/ I’ll play your game once more if you don’t feel right,” she sings in the chorus. It’s a song about giving up a part of your own happiness to placate someone you care about in order to preserve something that feels worth saving, and Jay Som presents that predicament in a sunny reverie.
That theme pops up repeatedly in Duterte’s writing, most effectively on “I Think You’re Alright” a devotional slow-burn that was released on a 7″ vinyl last year. On that song, she offers to act as someone’s support system to her own detriment .
The Fat Angel Sings 