Messy nights out in the pub, conquering stage fright and words of wisdom from Dave Grohl himself: TTSSFU – or Tasmin Stephens – has had a wild 18 months. Between riding the rollercoaster of life, the Wigan-born, Manchester-based DIY artist has quickly become one of the north-west’s most enthralling new acts.
When NME catches up with her on Zoom shortly after the release of ‘Call U Back’, the first single from her upcoming EP ‘Blown’ (out August 29), she describes the last weeks as an emotional whirlwind. “I was really worried about the single,” she admits. “I didn’t think it’d do very well. I’ve just listened to it so much that I was like, ‘Oh, this is shit!’, but now it’s out I’m like, ‘Oh no – this is actually the best thing I’ve ever released!’”
She might now be riding a creative high, but the EP’s inception was a challenge. Stephens found herself battling writer’s block and imposter syndrome – “I literally wanted to die. I’d just been signed and I couldn’t write a thing!” – immediately after being taken on by Partisan Records (Fontaines D.C., Geese). On top of that, her own assessment of her recent live performances had her doubting what she was making. “I realised my live sets were really doomer and not very… fun,” she says. “So my goal was to write some happy pop songs, but as I wrote them, nothing felt honest or real.”
It was only once she’d met someone who “really pissed [her] off” that she felt able to write again. The result is ‘Blown’: an abrasive, glitchy EP that takes reference from The Cure, Wolf Alice and Sky Ferreira. It follows Stephens as she navigates her very early adulthood; the punky opener ‘Cat Piss Junkie’ is “a chaos night-out anthem”, while the shoegazey ‘Forever’ is an ode to the musician’s best friend.
“And then it slowly starts going really downhill, into the deeper feelings of what’s going on…” she says. ‘Sick’ is a gothic descent into all-consuming lust, before she polishes off the EP with the Xiu Xiu-inspired ‘Being Young’. Catchy pop melodies are amplified through scuzzy distortion, siren-like guitar riffs and breathy vocals. Vulnerability seeps through with self-awareness, and the result is a melancholic piece of alt-pop.
Though terrified of revealing her secrets in such a public way, she reasons: “The privilege of being signed by someone like Partisan meant I really needed to push myself to be as open as I can be, because that’s where I find the best music.” It taught her she needed to write what she was feeling, despite dreading such exposure, because authenticity has always been the most important thing for her.
That’s something that was evident on Stephens’ previous EP, ‘Me, Jed and Andy’, which took inspiration from artists like Alex G, Soko and Coma Cinema, and was entirely self-made with Garageband. Taking that approach allowed Stephens to stay in control of the feelings she revealed through sound, while also providing “no pressure” and an opportunity “to really study” her own work, which she did obsessively. “I’ve always been quite cruel to myself and thought, if something is shit, then it’s shit and you need to realise that. I’m lucky that once I thought things were good enough, everything just kinda panned out.
TTSSFU first started picking up thanks to Stephens’ other project – the dreampop band Duvet, in which she plays guitar – getting signed to FOMO Records. From there “industry people” started taking an interest in her solo work, landing her support slots with the likes of Mannequin Pussy and Kim Deal. Her childhood dreams of “getting anywhere else” besides rural northern England were swiftly becoming a reality, and it was a lot to process.
“I really needed to push myself to be as open as I can be, because that’s where I find the best music”
“I was incredibly overwhelmed when I first got noticed. All of these incredible things I’d always wanted to happen were happening, but I barely remember any of it.” Suddenly, she was being told by Kim Deal “to wear shoes otherwise you’ll get electrocuted” and Missy from Mannequin Pussy was giving her advice to avoid burnout (“learn that you can say no, learn that there’s boundaries, and once they’ve been crossed you can say, ‘that’s enough.”).
“I used to get in a daze about these things, but I’ve really started to feel the emotions that come with these crazy but amazing situations. Like, I met Dave Grohl! He gave me the loveliest hug ever. He asked us how we found the show we’d just played, and the whole band were like, ‘We hated it, we thought it was shit’ and he just casually [said], ‘Yeah me and Nirvana used to always have that after shows’…we just looked at each other like, whaaaaat?!”
Having always suffered from stage fright, being thrust in front of giant crowds was not only a great bit of exposure therapy, but also gave Stephens the opportunity to experience her music in a new context – outside of her bedroom.
“Performing with a live band transformed the music and made it something completely different, and the songs sounded exactly how I wanted them to sound,” she says, which made her aware that her own skills could only take her so far. With this newfound realisation, she decided to bring in an extra pair of hands for ‘Blown’, and approached producer Chris Ryan (NewDad, Just Mustard) to help her along.
After a long Zoom call and writing “an essay of everything [she] thought was going wrong with the EP”, she felt she’d found an ally in Ryan to help bring the vision to life. “I knew he was my guy because he wasn’t just gonna come in and rip it apart,” she says. “I can be stubborn and a control freak when it comes to my music, so to trust people with it was a massive step.”
If one thing’s clear, it’s that almost every action she takes is a “massive step”. Her journey so far has involved giant leaps of faith and facing fears head-on, trusting she’ll be able to pick herself up if anything goes awry. That’s the prevailing theme of ‘Blown’, too. It’s the product of a young artist breaking through all the boxes she’s locked herself in by experimenting freely and slowly coming into her own.
TTSSFU’s ‘Blown’ EP is out on August 29 via Partisan Records.