Fragmented and Whole

In January 2025, the power went out. The winds were strong. My mom sent me a photo of the Palisades fire from the plane. Two friends lost their homes to both of the wildfires that consumed Los Angeles and the media. I sat in the dark singing to myself. Without electricity, I could not play piano, I could not make music. I could only express how I felt to a few blank journal pages.

I began to write a record.

1. Grief

2. OCD / Mental Health

3. Feminism

4. Loneliness/Longing

5. Romance

6. “Late bloomer”

7. Platonic Relationships

8. Flowers as metaphors

9. Self love/hatred

10. Reality vs. Fiction

Arguably, any flickering of hope blew out at the start of that year. The fires were just the start of the darkness that continues to consume America until today (July 19th, 2026). But I could not fathom the idea of shrinking myself further away from the heartbreak of the metaphorical and literal fires surrounding me. For so much of my life, I have made myself small so others can fit comfortably.

I had done that so much with music––fixing my voice, replacing words with someone else’s, writing in genres others assumed were a good fit for me––so producers and collaborators would find me appeasing, easy to work with, pleasant, kind.

Yet, like the age-old phoenix rising from the ashes, a confidence emerged. Knowing so much could be taken from me in an instant, I promised myself the next record would be written on instinct for no one else other than myself.

Another Fragment is an EP that reflects how a person can be fragmented, made up of pieces like a monotone kaleidoscope, and still be whole. She is made up of light, the hope “carried by the wind,” and held down by grief, the loss of people both alive and dead.

As early as January, the pieces of this album were showing up in early writings.

“I shred up your letters…”

“Building oneself from straw…” after staring at a scarecrow in the neighborhood

Already I could sense that this record was going to be all of the deepest parts of myself I tucked away. If I am honest, most of my loved ones don’t want to hear about my struggles with OCD, and many are exhausted from my grief over a seventeen-year friendship. All of these things need to be gotten over. Not beaten into the ground. Once they are buried, we walk away from them. We let the grass grow over, plant flowers to pay respects––done.

These experiences, repeated thoughts, unfortunately, are part of the fabric of my being. If artists like Noah Kahan and Olivia Rodrigo can be praised for taking the time to understand their own mind and express their compulsions in song, then why can’t I?

Hayley Williams, coincidentally, was writing Ego Death in Los Angeles. Having experienced the fear of the flames herself, she showed up for my city by performing at “Gve a Fck LA Wildfire Relief.” I stood in the second row listening to her as she explained that she didn’t feel comfortable being on stage alone and playing guitar.

Then, when she invited us to sing in a round during her cover of Bjork’s “All is Full of Love,” she approached my side of the stage and looked at me as I sang above those in my section. “Be confident with it,” Hayley said, and I knew she was speaking to me. Give into the sound within. Give in, give in. All is full of love, including you.

This was a synchronicity I couldn’t ignore. I felt like I was given permission. My ego died with hers.

The first song on the record that emerged was “Through.” I took Hayley’s lead, and listened to the sound of my internal melody. As someone who was influenced by early 90s R&B and hip hop and later performed on rap records, I let these words flow. It was the only song that did not get revised as heavily. It knew it needed to be born and became.

Still, I struggled with its beat because my OCD wasn’t sure if it was “right,” if it fit the image people had of me––put together, kind, confident. Still I knew, if I wanted to write a record that was reflective of my experience, I have to allow these songs to speak. I have to allow myself to speak through the song.

This song has three interpretations for me. While I assumed I was writing about the frustrations with how white people were coping with traumas (i.e. leaving the country, worrying about their own safety while my community was in active vigilance and fear) this song was teaching me a lot about my own feelings, thoughts, and experiences with trauma. More than that, how OCD further complicates how I process those traumas.

If I could get through writing this song, without any certainty people were going to like it, or me, I had to continue foraging through my own mind to excavate all of my fears and lay them out on the table.

One of my biggest fears is not being “Mexican enough.” I have written about it extensively in my book Cruzita and the Mariacheros. My entire life, in fact, I have grappled with my existence. Not white passing, not Mexican looking, people ask me who I am, what I am and I am done trying to justify my lineage, my lack of language, and why, why, why.

I just am. Just as I am angry. Just as I am grieving. I just am.

Writing “Viento” was healing. As I drove along the I-210 watching the Mexican flag fly during the first No Kings protest, I sang this melody for the next hour. All the way home. My anger, my heartache, all poured into this song. And in the last verse, I knew I had to put my Duolingo knowledge to the test.

I have heard Spanish spoken in my home my entire life. 2025 was the year I finally understood them, could write them, could sing them. Expressing myself in a different language, with the candor that made sense to me, made me realize I was enough all along. I only needed to give myself permission to be.

I wanted this album to be familiar and experimental. The sad sentiments, the little emo sprinklings, are what I know best. But the odd timings, a bridge in the middle of a song, Spanish guitars, Spanish lyrics, the whispering vocals and louder, nasally tones, sound effects––were not all previously part of my sonic palette. I grew into them. I grew into myself.

For the first time in my artistic career, I don’t feel like a voice lost in a choir. I don’t feel wrong. I don’t feel like I am pretending. I know. I am whole. And each of these little pieces that have broken or I’ve collected along the way have made me who I am, artistically and personally.

On Tuesday, July 14th, my latest EP Another Fragment released on streaming platforms and my Bandcamp. I invite you to listen, share, and spare anything you could towards my music career.

xo

Ashley Jean