Keli Holiday, the solo project of Adam Hyde from Peking Duk, has evolved remarkably since its inception in 2021, when it was first born out of heartbreak and personal turbulence.
Fast forward to today, and while Hyde is now very much publicly in love with girlfriend Abbie Chatfield, his new single, “Online Jesus,” draws inspiration from a different phase of his life, marked by the chaos and absurdity of online dating.
The heart of “Online Jesus” lies in the satire of dating apps, where Hyde explores the superficial, gamified nature of online romance. In an interview with Rolling Stone AU/NZ, he explains, “The theme of ‘Online Jesus’ is about online dating and how funny those apps are. A lot of the themes are about looking for love in all the wrong places or embracing and revelling in the chaos that comes with not having a significant other to pull you in, so to speak.”
Despite the song’s comedic tone, there’s a deeper layer of commentary embedded in its lyrics.
Hyde’s personal experience with dating apps was minimal while he was living in the US, but his female friends shared countless horror stories about the male-dominated world of digital dating. “It seems like a lot of them think they’re God’s gift to women,” Hyde says of men on these platforms. “They use these apps quite flippantly… They think that to be the best at the game is just the coolest shit.”
Image: Keli Holiday Credit: Supplied
This flippant, ego-driven behaviour of men in the dating app world became the central character Hyde and his collaborator, Alex Cameron, tapped into for the song. Cameron, known for his ability to craft compelling characters in his music, helped elevate the satire in “Online Jesus,” making the persona in the track both absurd and painfully real.
Hyde’s love of cinematic character creation, inspired by directors like Scorsese and Tarantino, shines through. “I love writing about characters that are really over the top,” he says. “What they smell like, what kind of car they drive, even what kind of cigarettes they smoke.”
In “Online Jesus,” Hyde embraces this penchant for detail, weaving humour and critique together. The exaggerated persona of the overconfident guy on a dating app – one who believes he’s irresistible – is both a hilarious caricature and a biting reflection of a real societal problem.
Yet, while the song takes a swipe at the superficiality of dating culture, Hyde is careful not to fully dismiss online dating, acknowledging that these apps are often a necessary tool for people to meet in today’s world. He hopes, though, that “those slimy motherfuckers on there that think they’re God’s gift to women” might take a long, hard look at themselves.
Musically, “Online Jesus” takes on a Britpop-meets-synth-pop vibe, a nostalgic sound that wasn’t entirely planned but evolved naturally during a jam session. Hyde recounts how the song came together unexpectedly: “We had about half an hour left in the studio. We’d packed up and then… I started jamming a drum beat… Alex started jamming the baseline, and then we laid down a freestyle melody.”
It’s often these spontaneous moments that lead to Hyde’s best work, a sentiment he echoes when he talks about his approach to Keli Holiday versus Peking Duk. While Peking Duk is rooted in electronic music and dance beats, Keli Holiday allows Hyde to explore rock, synth, and indie influences more freely.
“With Keli Holiday, I’m actually here to do the opposite and just express what the initial idea is,” he says. There’s a rawness and authenticity in the project that sets it apart from his work with Peking Duk. “It doesn’t matter if it sounds like dog shit or if it sounds like a sparkling diamond. If it’s true to what it is, then I’m with it.”
This authenticity extends to Hyde’s live performances, where the audience response has been overwhelmingly positive. He shares a particular moment from a recent tour, where the crowd sang along to his song “Do You Like It or Not,” a track he recorded as a voice memo on his iPhone. “The whole room moshes and screams every word, and I’m speaking gibberish in the verses — I’m not even saying words because it’s a voice memo, but they seem to do it exactly like the voice memo.” he laughs. This spontaneous, gut-driven approach to music is something Hyde has come to embrace fully with Keli Holiday, thanks, in part, to his new partner.
“I want to really extend my love and appreciation out there to Abbie Chatfield for helping me realise that every time I follow my animal instincts with an idea I can’t lose,” he says. “I think the reason why a lot of the time I might not fully lean into my instinct is because of my background with Peking Duk and electronic music production, which is always about making it sound really good and sound really tight and punching and kicking and all of that.”
There are other ways Hyde’s relationship has influenced his writing. “Now what I’m writing, it’s definitely influenced by love and attraction and all the beautiful things that come with finding someone that you can’t get enough of,” he says, referring to his relationship with Chatfield. Yet, he’s quick to dismiss the notion that heartbreak is essential for creating good art. “A lot of people say you need to be tortured, you need to be heartbroken to be a good artist. I think that’s bullshit,” Hyde declares. “Love is the coolest fucking emotion that we have as humans, and we’re lucky to experience it.”
Image: Keli Holiday and Alex Cameron Credit: Supplied
The goal for Hyde now, though, is establishing his own identity. It’s time for people to get to know Adam Hyde — or Keli Holiday — minus the other labels.
“It’s funny, I went from ‘the guy in Peking Duk’ to ‘Abbie Chatfield’s boyfriend,’ so now it’s about finding my step away from that,” he says. “But whatever, labels are labels and I get it. I think at the end of the day, I don’t really have anything to prove per se. I just want to make shit, and I want to perform shit, and I want to share that — and if people fuck with it, that’s great.”
Hyde recalls a fan encounter after a show in Brisbane, where a woman told him she had lost her husband a year earlier and thanked him for his music helping her be in a more positive space than she otherwise might have been.
“As she was saying that, I was kind of like, fuck, well, that’s beyond my job being done; I think me finishing a song is my job being done, so to speak,” Hyde explains. “Those moments are really quite transcendental in a bizarre way of, holy shit, I didn’t even know that this little song has that kind of power to do such big things. And if those kind of things happen, then that shit really keeps me going.”
With the anti-toxic masculinity message behind the Keli Holiday project, I ask him how he feels about being referred to as “Abbie Chatfield’s boyfriend” so frequently now. “I actually love it,” he laughs. “I think it’s great; I think it’s about time women got theirs. We had it for so long, it’s always like, oh, so-and-so’s wife.”
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Hyde says he will happily accept the label because he loves Chatfield and is proud of her, and finds it funny when people yell at him on the street. “I’m not insecure about being called that,” he laughs. “But it’s like, if you’re not going to come up and chat after that, you’re just going to yell at my face then that’s kind of stupid… But I think if anyone has a problem with it they need to take a long hard look at themselves and maybe have a long hard chat with their therapist, because it sounds like they have some serious insecurities going on that they need to fix.”
Hyde’s journey with Keli Holiday has been one of growth, both creatively and personally. The project has allowed him to explore different facets of himself, away from the high-energy electronic beats of Peking Duk. It’s a space where he can be vulnerable, humorous, and reflective, all while maintaining the energy and charisma that has made him a standout in the Australian music scene.
As he continues to push the boundaries of what Keli Holiday can be, Hyde is proving that there’s more to his artistry than just the party anthems of Peking Duk. He’s an artist capable of depth, nuance, and, above all, humour.
With “Online Jesus” leading the charge and more music on the way, Hyde’s solo project is poised to carve out its own unique space in the indie rock landscape. Or as he puts it, “If it feels good and it doesn’t feel forced, that’s the best.” And with Keli Holiday, it seems like Adam Hyde is just getting started.
Keli Holiday’s “Online Jesus” (ft. Alex Cameron) is out now.
