Melina Duterte isn't the same person she once was. Years spent producing for stellar artists across rock and pop, working with some of the most acclaimed producers in the game, and a stint touring the world as part of boygenius' backing band have transformed her into one of the most trusted and inspiring musicians in the alternative scene. Now, she's back with the first solo Jay Som album in six years, 'Belong', a record that pays tribute to influences both past and present to create something genuine, heartfelt and electric.

Compared to 2019's 'Anak Ko', a laid-back ode to lo-fi, 'Belong' is an explosive re-entry. Hints of that stripped-back bedroom-pop float into the tracklist in the form of snarling 'What You Need' and fuzzed-out closer 'Want It All', but it's in the anthemic highs and tearjerking lows that 'Belong' really fills its form.

'Float (ft. Jim Adkins)' is a punchy pop-punk track built to get a crowd jumping, while 'Past Lives (ft. Hayley Williams)' carries all the acerbic catharsis of any number of 'Brand New Eyes’-era Paramore hits. Elsewhere, dreamy acoustic track 'Appointments' twinkles with teary-eyed emotion, contrasting with the alt-electronica of opener 'Cards on the Table', sugary-sweet 'A Million Reasons Why', and post-punk-tinged 'Meander/Sprouting Wings'.

"I think of the last six years as school for me," she recalls. "I never went to college. I did two years at a community college before deciding that I was going to do music full-time, so I had to teach myself engineering and production. It was super hard; during the pandemic, I spent all of my stimulus cheques on audio gear and taught myself how to use it, then I started producing my friends' stuff for free."

"Eventually, that circle widened, and I found myself at Shangri-La Studios playing bass and doing additional production for boygenius, and then touring with them. I remember that Gunnersbury Park show in London where my ears hurt so badly from how loud the crowd was screaming, it was the best time of my life."

The months spent travelling around the world with The Boys pushed Melina into a new phase of her life, one where she was ready to take all the knowledge she'd gained on the road, alongside her honed studio expertise, and return to the Jay Som universe. That journey culminates in this new album.

"Seeing the way Phoebe, Julien and Lucy work, the way they intentionally set up their band and their studio, really made me think about how important the energy is to a song. Also, like, people love rock music. They want an opportunity to scream and just rock out, so that definitely made me want to enter the alt-rock world and create big songs that go super hard live. It pushed me into a place where I was like, 'OK, I'm ready to write my own music again'."

So, she was ready to write some songs, but where do you start after so long out? "I get bored easily if everything sounds the same. I wanted there to be different genres, but still be cohesive. Until this record, I'd never thought about the live show, and I'd never listened to external voices, but now I'm thinking like, 'OK, I have to play this riff live' or 'We can rock out on stage with this outro'."

So, you want something that can convey poignant emotion but also go incredibly hard in front of a live audience? Well, as if it wasn't clear already that Melina's the coolest person alive, she went out to Nashville to work with the legends of emo-rock: super-producer Steph Marziano and Queen of Everything, Hayley Williams.

Reflecting on that time, Melina can't keep the smile off her face. "That was definitely the first time I felt like an album was a possibility, even though I hadn't gone there with the intention of writing one. Steph is just so generous and kind, and obviously she's super talented, so it made it so easy for me."

"Hayley, I mean, she's Hayley Williams, y'know?! We used every track she recorded and basically every idea she brought to the table, too. I remember her turning to me and saying, 'Do you mind if I try something?', and she went into the booth and did her Paramore thing over the outro. I'm so lucky she did that!"

From there, 'Belong' really began to take shape. Melina brought in her best friend and long-time Jay Som guitarist Joao Gonzalez, along with a studio band that included boygenius and Chappell Roan tour drummer Madden Klaas. As if that weren't enough, Jimmy Eat World vocalist and pop-punk legend Jim Adkins joined the ride too, lending his vocals to the fierce yet tender alt-rock banger 'Float'.

"Once I got back from Nashville, I opened the door to other producers, and it was like puzzle pieces kept fitting together. I got to the point where I had 25 demos which all had hints of the themes and elements I wanted to express. I remember being like, 'OK, I actually have an album here!'"

"Working with other people made this experience so much quicker, but also richer. It was Jim's idea to harmonise in the verse, and that just makes the song for me. Collaboration brings me one step closer to understanding myself. I'm so lucky that I'm in a position where people have faith in me, I just keep pinching myself that this is my life."

Just as Melina isn't shy about giving her co-producers their flowers, she's equally open about the musical references that find their way into 'Belong', past and present.

"I'm 31 now, so I'm in an era where I just want to go back to my roots and listen to the stuff I liked in high school! I was listening to a lot of early-00s alt-rock, some nu-metal, and I'm a huge Death Cab for Cutie fan, so they always come in somewhere. Equally, The 1975 and The Japanese House really inspired 'Cards on the Table'. I'm very referential as a musician, but I'm not ashamed of that; don't we all write songs so that we can sound like our heroes?"

What's clear from all these references - she also mentions Radiohead's 'In Rainbows' as a formative album - is that Melina wears her heart on her sleeve. She may not have a formal music education, but sometimes you can't learn everything from teachers and textbooks.

"Knowing what I know now, I wouldn't go to school," she says. "For me, music in general is all emotion-based. It's all about intuition and the feelings that guide me in the work I do. I love the technical elements too, I'm always on forums trying to figure out how people make certain sounds, but I think if I knew too much about the process it would take some of the magic away."

'Belong' is a project that thrives on energy and authenticity. The pivot to pop-punk only works because it's grounded in something real. This is a record about connection, between collaborators, in Melina's personal relationships, but more importantly, between her and the listener.

"I'm excited for the album to come out because I feel like I can only really tell what it means to me once other people have heard it. Currently, I'm confused about what the album is doing for me, and I can only get a clearer idea of that once other people give me their theories and ideas about what they think certain songs are about. There's a magic in not knowing everything and not having all the answers just yet, so I'm excited to see what people relate to."

She's already had a glimpse of what a post-‘Belong’ world might look like, having played new songs on a mini-tour in May and during a wider US tour supporting alt-pop sweetheart Lucy Dacus.

"I don't like playing songs exactly how they are on record, it's just more fun that way, so we've played some new songs with key changes or new arrangements, but the energy in the crowd seemed to suggest that they got what we were doing."

Melina might be a very different artist than she was in 2019, one with bags of experience, but she's not naïve to the fact that the music industry is also a very different place than it was ten years ago, or even just before the pandemic when she released 'Anak Ko'.

"I'm coming into this knowing that I'm a new artist; people don't know who I am, so I have to come into this with enthusiasm and energy, I have to be as authentic as possible. There are many times when the magic of music is tested for me. The constant begging for attention and the business side of things is so different to when I started making music, but I'm still super grateful."

'Belong' might nominally be a Jay Som solo album, but it's a record stitched together by the relationships Melina has built over the last six years. It's a project rooted in platonic love, expert musicianship and a sense of community that underpins every lyric, riff and drumbeat.

"It's the first Jay Som record with co-producers. It felt so natural to include the people I love on this one. Six years hasn't felt like a long time, really, because I've said yes to every opportunity. I've created an open, welcoming world, and I couldn't have made this record without that."

Who can say how long it'll be before we hear another Jay Som record? Melina herself doesn't even know. But let's not get too ahead of ourselves. With 'Belong', she's reminded us exactly why her return was worth the wait. Although, if you don't mind, Melina — maybe don't leave it quite so long next time, yeah? Cheers.