complete tommy’s Jess Holt takes us track-by-track via her intimate, unfiltered, and brutally uncooked debut album ‘bruises’ – a grungy and gritty coming-of-age report that aches in and out because the Sydney-based artist bares her full self, scars and all.
for followers of Ethel Cain, Wolf Alice, Moist Leg, Julien Baker
Stream: “Plus One” – complete tommy
Not into microdosing, need the entire quantity. Name in a distraction, ’trigger I might do with out the comedown…
Intimate, unfiltered, and unapologetically intense, bruises is an simple – and irresistible – beast of an album.
However earlier than diving into complete tommy’s debut LP, it’s vital to grasp why singer/songwriter Jess Holt named herself ‘complete tommy’ within the first place – and much more importantly, what that moniker means to her.
Beforehand making sun-kissed, dance-friendly indie pop music below the alias Essie Holt, the Melbourne-born, Sydney-based artist took a pointy left flip earlier this 12 months when she reintroduced herself with a brand new title and a darkish, shoegaze-inspired post-punk sound.
“My mother and father had been gonna name me Thomas if I used to be a boy, and I’ve at all times been a little bit of a tomboy and thought it suited me higher than Jess,” she explains. “And ‘complete’ – as a result of I’m obsessive about symmetry, so I wanted the syllables to match ‘tommy.’”
“For me, it means a variety of one thing, and that’s what I’m – all or nothing. Zero moderation right here.”
This sentiment holds very true for holt’s first full-length album as complete tommy: A daring, brash, brutally trustworthy coming-of-age report, the aptly titled bruises aches in and out as Holt bares her full self – scars and all – in twelve impassioned, weak, and uncooked songs.
So what if we’re late to start out the day
Hey I really like the stuff you say
After we’re bare below covers
Closed all of the shutters
You bought me coming undone
I wanna strive in your plus one
It’s how we break the stress
Each time we get it on
I wanna make you scream till you —
– “Plus One,” complete tommy
Launched November 29th, 2024 by way of [PIAS] Recordings, bruises is a panoramic triumph of a debut, in addition to a spellbinding introduction to Jess Holt’s complete tommy.
“complete tommy began once I moved cities, got here out, and hung out correctly attending to know myself,” she says. “Elements of my mind bought unlocked that I’d by no means been capable of faucet into earlier than, and with that I rapidly bought to be taught loads about who I used to be. I partied a lot with new queer mates, fell in love, made errors, and wrote music to make sense of all of it.”
Holt first ‘launched’ complete tommy on the prime of this 12 months, and has spent the previous eleven months dazzling audiences the world over via an exhilarating array of dreamy and dramatic various rock reveries. Her uncooked, scuzzy, emotionally charged guitar-driven music has been hailed as a neo-bedroom pop return by some, and as an homage to grunge-era legends like Rubbish and (her private heroes) Gap by others; no matter you name it, there’s no denying the truth that the sound she and producer Mark Zito (of Fractures) have crafted collectively has carried out its job to get folks speaking and listening.
For Holt, bruises is brutal.
A lot of its songs come from a very tough interval of stress, turmoil, development, and self-discovery, capturing the friction she felt inside as she skilled – or fairly, endured – a number of main life adjustments, roughly abruptly.
“This report is assortment of songs from the final three years of my life, about some enormous adjustments I went via, like transferring cities, ending a long-term relationship, popping out as queer, it goes on… On the time I by no means stopped to grasp how particular, but in addition painful a few of these moments had been. Penning this report helped me course of every little thing,” Holt tells Atwood Journal.
“I don’t assume I set out figuring out I wished to make a report initially, however as I began writing and telling these tales, it turns on the market was loads to cowl,” she provides. “I began to get the center of the report and sonic imaginative and prescient from songs like ‘Shedding Out,’ ‘microdose,’ and ‘REAL.’ Then once I began excited about enjoying these songs dwell and the way I wished it to be a rock present, I began writing songs like ‘SPIDER’ and ‘Plus One.’ The ultimate items of the report had been the quieter moments which helped give it mild and shade – like ‘ribs’ and ‘Shark Assaults.’”
Holt candidly describes bruises as scuzzy, gritty, and dirty.
The album’s evocative one-word title got here from a dialog with a pal.
“We had been speaking about going via life and leaving little bruises on your self and different folks,” she recollects. “It’s part of rising up and navigating issues, I assume. However this report is about the entire little scuffs I left on others and myself throughout this time.”
Bruises damage, they usually present – the bodily ones linger on the pores and skin, simply because the emotional ones stay on the guts. So far as introductions are involved, Holt feels this report not solely stays true to its title as an expression of inside aching, but in addition presents an genuine depiction of her personal humanity.
“Lyrically, it’s probably the most trustworthy and upfront I’ve ever been,” she admits. “I ended caring concerning the ramifications of individuals I do know listening to the songs and reacting a sure manner; I simply type of wrote for myself and expressed myself with none filtering.”
Consequently, bruises is ruthlessly and relentlessly uncooked – a high quality that makes its songs all of the extra alluring, all-consuming, and irresistible.
Highlights abound on the turbulent journey from the album’s pressing, emotionally charged opener “ADELINE” to its tender nearer “Shark Assaults.” Holt spills her soul twelve instances over as she aches brazenly and unapologetically, treating her audiences to a nonstop slew of heated alt-rock eruptions and impassioned upheavals.
“microdose,” initially launched as complete tommy’s debut single this previous February, is an intoxicating three-minute head-spin: A hazy, hypnotic, multi-layered reverie that hits arduous via emotional vocals, intense Strokes-y drums, and angsty guitars.
“Shedding Out,” the artist’s heated second single, is a dreamy, dramatic alt-rock upheaval of intimate and epic proportions – a much-needed confrontation and cathartic launch abruptly that sees an empowered and energized Holt calling out somebody who wronged her deeply. “False pretence / you assume you bought away with it,” she sings, sporting her coronary heart on her sleeve as she breaks right into a heavy, biting, and brutally trustworthy refrain:
You possibly can inform everybody that you simply’re shedding out
Downplay prefer it was only one mistake
Refill till you break down in rage
You retain saying you’re sorry
You swear you didn’t imply
the sh*t that you simply stated
Wishing it could all go away
Wish to see me on the weekend to say
Sorry, but it surely’s not sufficient
“‘Shedding Out’ is a giant one for me,” Holt says, citing it as one among her private favourite complete tommy songs. “I signed an NDA about this factor that occurred to me, which I used to be type of silenced in speaking about. And on this tune it’s a bit, iykyk…”
Whereas she will be able to’t go into particulars (for authorized causes) concerning the occasions that transpired, Holt elaborates on the tune’s creation: “Somebody I revered fully broke my belief and left me paralysed for a short while. I spent a variety of time going via the motions and feeling actually thrashed about. I’d delayed writing about this time for a number of months, however as quickly as I began every little thing was tremendous visceral and the lyrics fashioned in about fifteen minutes.”
Further standouts embrace the smooth, heartfelt confessional “ribs” (one other “actually particular” Holt favourite), the exhilarating pop/rock anthem “SODA,” the grungy rager “SPIDER,” and the feverish and infectiously catchy sex-fueled singalong “Plus One.”
Holt lets her innermost bruises shine on “REAL,” a weak, visceral, and completely seductive eruption born out of that post-breakup dizziness “the place you’re dipping out and in of actuality,” as she describes it. “It’s the whirlwind of irrational ideas you might have about whether or not your resolution was proper, and the guilt of breaking somebody’s coronary heart. It’s the reminiscing, the damage, the love that stays for some time after. However in the end, figuring out you probably did the precise factor for your self.”
Confirmed up empty-handed
to your own home on a weekend
It’s a nasty transfer, child I’m unhealthy information
Ought to’ve seen it coming, was a protracted shot
I’ll exit if I bought
In relation to doing one thing I remorse
So I assume, I’m filled with it
Please say that you really want me again
‘Trigger I would like you again
I do know I’m good for one thing,
however was supplying you with nothing
Put vitality into strangers,
we’ve bought all of the pages
We rolled collectively, we stated ceaselessly
However what the f* does that imply?
– “REAL,” complete tommy
Whereas “Shedding Out” and “ribs” are her two favourite songs at the moment, Holt has various lyrical highlights from everywhere in the album.
“There’s a line in ‘Shark Assaults’ which is me to a tee: ‘Frightened of getting in shark assaults, residing as an insomniac. Reality is saying every little thing’s effective, figuring out that it’s our deadly crime’. ‘Trigger generally once I’m in bother, I don’t ask for assist. Like I’d actually be in a shark assault, and I wouldn’t wave my hand for assist. Possibly I’d now although. And dwell, I really like the road in ‘REAL’ that goes ‘We stated ceaselessly, however what the f*** does that imply!?’”
In the end, bruises shines a hopeful, therapeutic mild on our personal inside darkness.
No matter adjustments or upheavals we is likely to be going via for the time being, complete tommy’s music is a passionate reminder that we’re not alone – and that we’ll make it via. Aching although it might be – and unapologetically so – this debut album is a cathartic, and actually charming, launch.
“I hope listeners really feel empowered to take dangers in life and push themselves to discover a path that makes them joyful,” Holt shares.
“Even when that is likely to be arduous within the brief time period. That’s what I’ve realised – processing all of these things and never regretting a factor, as a result of I solid a path for myself that lets me dwell authentically and do issues the best way I wish to do them.”
Expertise the complete report by way of our beneath stream, and peek inside complete tommy’s bruises with Atwood Journal as Jess Holt takes us track-by-track via the music and lyrics of her debut album!
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Stream: ‘bruises’ – complete tommy
:: Inside bruises ::
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ADELINE
The report was truly just about carried out once I wrote this tune. I used to be in Melbourne with my pal Mark and my spouse CP, ending off another tracks. It was near the top of the day and felt impressed to write down one thing contemporary. “ADELINE” is an alias for my youthful self, and this tune is a letter to her.
REAL
I’m SO pleased with this tune and it’s my favorite on the report. It’s a few break up and the warped actuality you reside in for some time after leaving a long run relationship.
Shedding Out
Lyrically that is probably the most straight up, brutal observe on bruises. I cherished experimenting with some extra talky model vocals within the writing of this, and having an enormous rocky refrain that type of hits you unexpectedly.
SODA
I wrote this one with my spouse, nearly 3 years in the past now. It was the primary complete tommy tune written truly. ‘Til the occasion’s misplaced its SODA’ is such a enjoyable lyric that I really like.
Ghost
This was written in Berlin with my lovely pal Stef. I had a variety of enjoyable with auto tune on this one, one thing I normally don’t get pleasure from however for this tune it simply labored. It got here collectively so rapidly, Stef has this superb manner of capturing magic. If we’re ever writing and the tune isn’t working, we simply transfer on. We barely touched it from the primary day demo we had! I’m very sentimental about Ghost.
ribs
I’m additionally so pleased with this one. Written a few pal going via a extremely arduous time, and me wanting to assist however not feeling like I had the power to. It closes off aspect A of the report so superbly.
microdose
This was my first single for tommy, and it actually kick-started every little thing. This was a giant tune for unlocking the tommy sound, and Mark (my producer) and I felt every little thing make sense once we wrote this one. Dan Carey blended it, and took it to a complete different degree.
SPIDER
The heaviest tune on the report that’s SO enjoyable in our dwell present. Impressed by a spider on the wall in my studio, which then become an analogy for a clingy pal. The spider stayed your entire time I used to be penning this tune, after which as soon as it was completed – the spider left.
Plus One
A tune about intercourse. I used to be listening to a variety of Bikini Kill and Gap on the time.
Amsterdam
I used to be in London, and flew in that morning for a session. I’d had an enormous night time in Amsterdam the night time earlier than – I ate an area cake and bought manner too excessive. I spent the entire day strolling round on my own, largely having a good time, but in addition having a loopy existential second. I bought into the studio and wrote about all of it. It’s positively the silliest observe on the report.
Girlfriend
I wrote this tune once I was very excessive on codeine after having my tonsils eliminated. It was written across the similar time as SODA. I used to be impressed by Tegan and Sara’s ‘Nearer’ – I really like that tune a lot and wished to seize that type of lesbian vitality.
Shark Assaults
I added this tune to the report within the closing week that I needed to submit it for vinyl urgent, and now I couldn’t think about this physique of labor with out it. I wrote it about irrational fears and the entire little issues that preserve me up at night time.
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an album by complete tommy
