GORDI: AUTONOMY RESHAPED

Vasili Papathanasopoulos
2 days ago
18 min read

Updated: 48 minutes ago

SEPTEMBER 2025

Photographs by Vasili Papathanasopoulos.

For five long years, the songs that make up Gordi’s stunning third album, Like Plasticine, lived a secret life. They simmered quietly in lockdown bedrooms, in fleeting studio bursts, on looped beats and bass lines, forming gradually into the most expansive and emotionally resonant body of work from the Australian artist to date. Now, they’re no longer just hers. They belong to the world- and Gordi wouldn’t have it any other way.

“It feels awesome,” she says with a warm grin, still glowing from the album’s release week. “It’s really nice to work on something for so long and then you sort of... I think working on records I always find I sort of fall in and out of love with them in the process of making them just by virtue of being with them for so long. It makes you kind of fall in love with the songs all over again when you see other people hearing them and engaging with them.”

The rooftop of Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art, drenched in drizzle and wrapped in anticipation, became the stage for one of those reconnections. “To already sort of see people recognising the new songs and enjoying them - it's very affirming and it feels really, really wonderful. But it's no longer just mine.” That particular night at the MCA felt special for the singer. Not just because it was one of Gordi’s first major post-release shows, but because of what it represented. When her last album, Our Two Skins, dropped in 2020, the world was in lockdown, and with it, so was Gordi. “I remember when my second record came out, like sort of doing press and those sort of opportunities, you had to do them all from home,” she recalls. “I had to somehow make the house I was living in look like a million different sets… It was like so depressing [laughs].” The contrast couldn’t be more clear now. Between playing Lollapalooza, touring Europe with Foster The People, and making her debut on The Kelly Clarkson Show, she’s been everywhere and is embracing the chaos. “The Kelly Clarkson show was definitely I think probably the highlight of the year... All the Kelly fans came out of the closet. [Laughs] Or maybe they were never in the closet to begin with. It was very cool.” But Like Plasticine is more than a career milestone, it is a deeply personal testament to transformation.

Shirt, Treasure & Bond. Shorts, Treasure & Bond. Shoes, Dr Martens.

Written in the wreckage of a pandemic, through isolation and grief, it began with silence. There was no flash of inspiration, but a slow, deliberate process of emergence. One that mirrors the album’s title in its malleability and gradual shaping. “I kind of break it down into a few stages,” she says, tracing the arc of a creative journey that began in stillness. “Stage one being, I couldn't write anything. Like I was just really struggling during the pandemic to write any songs.” That creative block lingered, marking a rare silence for an artist whose songwriting has always been steeped in emotional clarity. But eventually, something shifted. “The second stage is that I went to Sydney and kind of locked myself away for like a week at a six month interval. I basically just tried to write completely unfiltered for those two weeks, and those songs would end up forming the record.” It was in these self-imposed writing retreats that Gordi began laying down the emotional and sonic DNA of the album. “During that time as I was writing them, I was kind of recording as they were being written,” she recalls. “Because I was largely by myself, a lot of them were sort of based on these loops that I had made in the space.”

She built songs from solitary loops: four or eight bars of drums, bass, or synths. Simple musical foundations formed in isolation. These early fragments were raw and minimal, but full of potential, serving as the essential spines of what the songs would eventually become. The final phase came when Gordi returned to the studio, ready to build on those skeletal loops and breathe life into what had started as static sketches. “I got into the studio, and using those sort of sparse loops, I sort of injected as much life onto them as I could.” That act of reinvention, fuelled by layering, expanding, sculpting, was where the record truly began to take form. “When I think about the journey they took, they started musically from quite a static beginning, and then they sort of over time became almost alive by the end of the process.” With Like Plasticine, she has shaped something deeply personal from the quiet chaos of isolation; a body of work that bends, stretches, and ultimately comes alive in her hands.

For Gordi, the act of songwriting has always been fluid, but the evolution of her process in recent years has mirrored deeper shifts in her life and perspective. “It totally takes on its own form,” she reflects. “I have found with every year I grow older, my creative process morphs and changes. Previously I'd always felt like my songwriting was like a dripping tap. It was just kind of happening all the time. I would just pick up an instrument any time I felt moved, which was often, and write a song.” That once steady flow came to an unexpected halt during the pandemic, a moment in time that left her questioning whether the creative well had run dry. “I thought, ‘has the tap just turned off?,” she says. But when she shifted her environment and her approach, something profound happened. “I turned up at this place in Sydney and, to drag on the water metaphor, it had formed like an underground spring instead. I sort of just had to go down and find the water instead of it just dripping out.” This reconnection revealed something essential about the nature of her artistry. “The process for me is constantly evolving,” she says, “and I think there's something kind of unknowable and magic about songwriting, and that speaks to that. That it's a constantly changing and evolving process.” It’s this quiet metamorphosis of process, of sound, of self, that makes Like Plasticine feel not just like an album, but a document of transformation.

Singlet, Kloke. Pants, Lovers + Friends. Shoes, Dr Martens.

I tell her that the record presented itself to me as a second coming-of-age story, marking a profound period of change. She acknowledges, “I definitely felt at a transformation point in my life. I feel like we get them periodically. I mean, some people say that every thirty years a new act is born.” This turning point was intensified by the pandemic, a backdrop that disrupted not only her livelihood as a musician but also the rhythm of everyday life. “It was in the context of… me having kind of lost my work, as in my music work and my livelihood,” she says, highlighting how the external crisis mirrored internal uncertainty. More than just a pause, this moment signified an end to what she calls “the first part of life,” a time of living week to week, surrounded by friends, that she notes many musicians seem to inhabit longer than most. Watching those around her move into new phases - starting families, relocating, shifting priorities - created a palpable friction. “I sort of watch the people around me drift out of that and into a new phase of life. Which is beautiful in a different way, but… it did really feel like this sort of friction.” That discord captures the tension between clinging to familiar comforts and stepping into the unknown, a universal feeling magnified by the unpredictability of the start of the decade. Gordi reflects on the delicate balance between control and surrender, questioning “how much agency do we have over the way that we change vs how much are these forces that we can't control forcing us to change.” This idea, sharpened by lockdowns, loss, and collective grief, feeds directly into the album’s emotional core. “People lost their jobs, people lost their lives, people lost their families. There was a great sort of tragedy that happened, but in smaller ways in life these things kind of get thrust upon you and you have to withstand it.” The metaphor of plasticine, the album’s namesake, captures these themes beautifully. It’s “this malleable, unbreakable substance… put under all these different forces… changed into all these shapes, but at its core its substance stays the same.” For the singer, this represents the resilience inherent in human experience; the way we bend and reshape ourselves through trials without ever fully losing our essence. Like Plasticine becomes more than a collection of songs; it’s a testament to the evolving self, shaped by circumstance but grounded in an enduring core.

That period of unexpected stillness during the pandemic proved to be a crucible of emotional turmoil for Gordi, one marked by profound isolation and grief. Reflecting on those years, she reveals, “I really struggled. I'd moved out of the place I'd been living in Sydney for many years, because I was gonna be away all year. Then I found myself living in Melbourne where I didn't know anybody. All my family and friends were in New South Wales and the border had closed. I felt really lonely and isolated and sad to be honest. It was a really dark time for me.” Far from the creative immersion she had anticipated, Gordi was instead anchored in the medical field, her sole outlet a frontline job “with tragedy around the clock.” The sudden halt of music tours and connections with heroes she admired left her grappling with a deep sense of loss. “For that sort of eighteen month, two year period, I don't look back on it fondly whatsoever. I feel while there were lots of people in other places who suffered a great deal more, I certainly felt this sense that I'd been seated and felt a sense of grief over all these plans that I had. These tours with some of my absolute heroes that just kind of went off a cliff. I think yeah, a sense of grief is the best way to describe it.” Emerging from that crucible of uncertainty, Gordi now finds herself stepping fully into a new chapter defined by what she calls “real agency.” This is a marked departure from earlier phases of her life, when she often felt constrained by external expectations, whether it was the structure of school, university, or her medical training, all of which dictated where she needed to be and when. “I was always sort of squeezing in music where I could,” she explains, revealing how her creative work was once an act of fitting passion around obligation. The year 2020 had promised a shift, an opportunity to claim more control, but the pandemic’s upheaval delayed that transition. Now, as she moves past that “friction point,” Gordi embraces the exhilarating yet daunting reality that “what my next six months, year, five years looks like is entirely and only kind of up to me.” This newfound autonomy permeates the album, infusing it with a spirit of self-determination and exploration. It’s not only a reflection of personal growth but also a fearless assertion of creative freedom, an invitation to witness an artist reshaping her own future on her own terms.

Vest, Cult Bravery. Jeans, NōSKIN.

Gordi’s process of sharing such intimate work is marked by a complex mix of fear, honesty, and careful self-protection. I ask her if there is any apprehension about being so personal in her music, she replies simply, “Yes is the short answer [laughs].” She explains that when writing, she’s not imagining the songs will ever be heard, so she’s “writing them completely uncensored and unfiltered.” It’s only later, when “I remember that it’s about me and my life,” that the reality of sharing something so raw sinks in. “By the time I remember that it's about me and my life, it's too late [laughs]. There's the song out in the world.” This candid admission reveals how vulnerability in her music is almost accidental, a by-product of the creative process itself rather than a deliberate choice. Yet, Gordi has developed ways to protect herself; “the way that I navigate being too honest is through secretive language.” This use of coded or metaphorical lyrics acts as a shield, allowing her to express pain, joy, or confusion without fully exposing every detail. Interestingly, she finds the hardest part comes after the music is released, in interviews where “people are asking you point blank what things are about.” Despite this, Gordi acknowledges that “there’s things I’m able to keep private and things that I feel comfortable being honest about,” suggesting a careful balancing act. “I guess I sort of reach that decision point by the time the music comes out.”

On Like Plasticine, Gordi expands her sonic palette more boldly than ever before, stepping beyond the folk-rooted electronica she’s known for and into a broader, more experimental sound world. But rather than consciously chasing a new genre or trend, her approach was rooted in a kind of creative freedom. "Well, I'm certainly living in a post-genre world," she says, making it clear that these shifts weren’t about reinvention so much as removing limitations altogether. "I don't feel like I've ever really sat in a genre that's easy to describe." It’s a sentiment that feels reflective of both her catalogue and her identity as an artist; someone for whom genre has always felt too narrow a frame. Even outside the studio, this ambiguity follows her. "Every time I get to the immigration desk at LAX, they always ask me, 'what do you do?' And I say, I'm a musician. And they say, 'what kind of music do you put out?'" She laughs at the memory, but there's something telling in her answer: "I'm always like, 'honestly, I can't really describe it,' but I pick something different every time. Because I don't really feel like they wanna engage in the discussion about the post-genre [laughs] world.”

This genre-agnostic ethos underpins the entire album. "To be honest, for this record I was really unbothered by genre and style. I wanted to kind of focus the music more on emotion." That emotional focus drove a freer, more instinctive creative process, often shaped by whatever music she was engaging with in the moment: "I think whatever music I'm making at the time is always reflective of music I'm listening to at the time, or engaging with or find interesting.” On the technical side the album also plays with contrast. Many tracks began as tightly looped structures, but Gordi was determined to inject a looser, more human feel: "Because of the way the music was initially recorded on these kind of static loops, I really wanted phase two of it to feel really played." You can hear it in the slack bass line of Cutting Room Floor or the raw textures that cut through Your Consolation Prize. "I wanted that contrast of elements that had been kind of gently perfected, and then elements that were really kind of raw and scraggly.” That interplay between polish and imperfection mirrors the album’s emotional range, a deliberate move to reflect its central theme. "The record kind of goes across the breadth of many like vibes," she says. "And that to me kind of fed back into the concept of the record… the spectrum of life and these transformation points… the spectrum of agony to ecstasy." From the hushed restraint of Peripheral Lover to the explosive God Damn, Gordi captures the full stretch of what it means to be reshaped - like plasticine - by the things that nearly break us.

Shirt, Treasure & Bond. Shorts, Treasure & Bond. Shoes, Dr Martens.

For Gordi, producing isn’t just a technical role. It’s an extension of her emotional and creative instincts. “I think I have learned over the years that no one wants to spend six hours finessing a transition in my music, like I do,” she laughs, but it’s less self-deprecation than quiet assertion. She knows that emotional impact is often carried in those subtle shifts; the way one sound folds into the next, or how a texture can tilt a lyric into deeper resonance. It’s clear that producing isn’t just about overseeing a session or managing arrangements for Gordi; it’s about chiselling at a song’s surface until its emotional core is unmistakable. “Maybe there's a lesson in that for me as well,” she adds, hinting at the tension between perfectionism and instinct. Still, she’s clear that Like Plasticine wasn’t a solo endeavour. “For this record, I definitely knew I didn't wanna make it alone,” she says. Instead, she invited in a small circle of trusted collaborators - producers Brad Cook, John Congleton, and Matias Mora - each of whom brought their own distinct sensibilities. “The producers that I brought on, and musicians to kind of collaborate on different songs, brought so much to each of them in their own way. Like those songs wouldn't sound the way they do without those people.” It was a balancing act: protecting the intimacy of her vision while opening it up to other voices.

Once the foundational recording sessions were complete, Gordi returned to the material with a different kind of focus; not to rebuild, but to refine. “The songs were finished in a sense. We'd finished kind of the bulk of the recording, but then I took them all back and just kind of sat with them for six months.” That long, solitary stretch wasn’t an afterthought, it was where the real shaping happened. Rather than layering more onto the tracks, she began removing, listening, stripping them down to their essence. “It was interesting because I think more than ever my own production style became more like sculpting, you know, where it's like I had this big slab of marble or whatever it is, and just slowly over those six months kind of chiseled things away until I felt like I had only the elements that I wanted to be there.” In that metaphor, you can hear the care and control, not in a rigid sense, but in a tactile, intuitive one. She wasn’t editing for perfection, but for cohesion, tone, and emotional weight. “I could also put elements here and there that sort of added a bit of cohesion.” On an album recorded across different studios, with different people and energies feeding into it, cohesion wasn’t a given. “Sometimes if you're recording it in the style that I did, which is in lots of places with lots of different people, that's obviously something that can go out the window.” So she made time for the opposite of chaos: silence, space, and slow decisions. “I felt bringing it back and just sitting with it by myself was sort of the essential last step.” In a body of work so defined by transformation, this final phase that was careful, quiet and deliberate, is what allowed Like Plasticine to truly take shape.

I ask her how locations influence her creativity, after all the album was recorded across the globe. “Making music and making records is just a series of decisions. I think that your surroundings always influence your decisions, whether consciously or subconsciously. I think the songs that I made in Durham in North Carolina with Brad Cook… his studio is just in his house. So it's like the drum kits in the living room and the synths and whatever in the control room. There's something about those songs, there's a really beautiful looseness to some of them, where I feel like that was the vibe of our work there. That was the vibe of the place. Whereas Alien Cowboy I made with Matias Mora in their low-lit studio in LA, and it was kind of like things felt dark. There was a darker energy there, and I feel like that kind of came through in the song. I'm always a big believer in the difference that a location can make. In a way, it helps kind of bring a lot of variation to this record“

Singlet, Kloke. Pants, Lovers + Friends. Shoes, Dr Martens.

Translating the diverse soundscape of Like Plasticine into a live show is a challenge Gordi is actively embracing. She’s deep in the process of sifting through the stems of the albums studio recordings to find ways to recreate the records emotional depth on stage. Having already tested some of the songs live over the past year, her aim now is to perform the entire record live during her upcoming Australian shows. But she’s clear about one thing; she doesn’t want her concerts to feel like a carbon copy of the album. “I never like going to a show and it feels like I just could have pressed play on the CD at home and it would be the same,” she explains. Instead, Gordi wants to infuse her live performances with a dynamism and energy that only a live setting can deliver, where the subbass reverberates through the crowd and the music comes alive in new, visceral ways. Striking this balance between fidelity to the recorded songs and bringing them into a more vibrant, live context is a delicate task. Gordi’s approach is thoughtful: she preserves the core emotional truths of each track while opening space for spontaneous moments that breathe new life into the music. Ultimately, her mission goes beyond entertainment; she wants to create an atmosphere where the audience feels deeply connected to the songs, to the point of tears. “It's always my mission to make as many people weep as possible. So that's my focus. Get the criers crying,” she laughs, revealing a playful yet sincere dedication to emotional authenticity.

Navigating the challenge of curating a setlist after three albums is something Gordi openly admits she’s still figuring out. “Oh, dude, I do not know. I don't know how people do this,” she laughs, capturing the honest uncertainty behind crafting a live show that satisfies both herself and her audience. Without the anchor of a breakout hit, Gordi says, “I have the blessing and the curse of never really having been an artist with like an absolute hit song. So I feel like I can kind of pick whatever I like to play [laughs].” This freedom allows her to lean into what feels right creatively, while still paying attention to fan favourites: “I feel like I'm constantly looking on streaming to be like, what song the people expect to hear. There are always a few from my back catalog that will always be in the list.” Ultimately, she trusts her instincts and the organic flow of the performance: “Mostly, I play what I want and what I think is gonna put on a good show. It's a process of trial and error for sure.” In this way, Gordi’s setlist becomes a living, evolving thing. One that balances audience expectations with her desire to keep the live experience fresh, intimate, and deeply personal.

The intimate connection with her audience goes far beyond the music itself. It is the very heartbeat of performing live. “Oh, it's critical,” she says when I ask her of the importance of fostering a connection with fans at live shows. “You think about how much music has changed, like our consumption of music over the past ten, twenty, hundred years. The thing that remains unchanged is live music. I mean, a few more people are probably using Ableton tracks than they were in 1920 [laughs]. I think on the whole, it's this kind of amazing collective experience that you just can't find anywhere else.” That sense of shared energy, the physical presence of being “in a crowded room and having that experience, the connection with the artist, but also the connection with people around you,” is something Gordi treasures deeply. “I find releasing albums as a funny process because there's so much buildup to it. Then on the day you're kind of just refreshing Instagram to see if people are engaging with it. That can kind of feel quite hollow. The following day when I was playing the show and I finished and people at the end are applauding and there's this kind of magic spark of connection that I get with them. I felt so overwhelmed. I was kind of in tears on stage because I was thinking back to myself in 2021, sitting at my desk in my house, head in my hands, you know, there's no live music happening thinking, 'how am I ever gonna live? How am I gonna move forward if I can't have that experience?' And then fast forward to putting this record out, and I'm kind of living it again. This time in a way that I can actually see the faces of people who are listening to this thing that I worked hard to make. So, yeah, there's nothing else like it.” Live music isn’t just a performance, it’s an irreplaceable, soulful exchange that breathes life into her art and her audience alike.

Vest, Cult Bravery. Jeans, NōSKIN.

For Gordi, the challenges facing Australia’s live music scene are complex and deeply felt. She points to how the pandemic not only disrupted live events but also altered how a whole generation relates to music. “I do think we're in a really challenging period right now. I think post pandemic, there was kind of a cultural shift in a way. I think the next generation came through and as young people engaging with live music, there was an age group that were kept in lockdown during some formative years of their lives.” On top of that, economic pressure and broader cultural shifts have pulled attention away from local scenes, creating a difficult environment for artists and venues alike. “I think also we got hit with the cost of living crisis, and I think after those years of being unable to travel people had a desire to sort of look beyond the borders of Australia for their kind of cultural input into their life.” Yet, despite these hurdles, Gordi is optimistic about the talent within the country: “That's not for want of talent, you know, there's as much talent as there's ever been coming through, of established artists and of up and coming artists.” She stresses the importance of live music as a vital thread in Australia’s cultural tapestry, “I think as a national community, we need to kind of remember that Australian music is such an important part of the fabric of our society, and live music really underpins that.” Looking ahead, she hopes that as economic pressures soften, people will return to engaging with local music, “I would hope that we sort of, as the cost of living crisis starts to ease, which it will and it's already doing, I think that we'll start to see hopefully people out and about more. People engaging with Australian music and hopefully kind of making it part of their everyday life in a way that supports local artists.” Gordi’s words highlight both the fragility and resilience of the scene, reminding us that the future of Australian music depends on community, connection, and support at every level.

Now, with Like Plasticine out in the world, Gordi basks in the rare clarity that follows transformation. The album, forged in grief and solitude, is no longer a quiet archive of survival but a living document of resilience, one that bends and breathes with every stage it will be played on. It’s the sound of an artist not just finding her footing after the collapse, but learning to thrive in the ruins. Graceful, grounded, and completely unafraid to stretch into something new. As Gordi continues to reshape herself and her sound, one thing remains certain: no matter how many forces act upon her, the core will hold. And from that unbreakable centre, something beautiful will always emerge.