In the midst of a global pandemic, Georgia, or G Flip has developed an obsession in isolation. Confessing, she often finds things to obsess over, “I’ll be obsessed with something different every month.”
G explained her most recent obsession; “Normally it’s more audio gear, or like guitars, you know, something more music-related. But recently in isolation, I became obsessed with slippers, and I’ve bought like five pairs of slippers online”. Like many of us, her isolation diet is somewhat different to normal, “I’ve been eating so much toast!” she giggled before inquiring of me if I prefer, “Smooth or Crunchy?” Obviously crunchy.
With normal life being filled with tours, recording, performing and writing, no one would begrudge G Flip some downtime. While she admits she’s “gotten better at snoozing” being in one place for the past few months, she certainly hasn’t been idle. She’s been performing unreleased music and acoustic versions of current hits for her fans via YouTube.
Not only that, but she’s also released both a new single, ‘Hyperfine’ and an animated video, produced with the help of Dan Wakehurst. Discussing the clip, she says the animation wasn’t a direct consequence of COVID-19, “it was always going to be animated, and once COVID happened it was like, wow that was a great idea, it worked well with the situation”.
The idea came to her during long stints of playing “Nintendo Switch, old PlayStation 1 & 2, Spyro and games I used to play when I was younger, and I just got a little bit into animation and gaming animation. I’d make myself Pinterest boards on art and design, and creative clip
Deciding her next clip would be in this style, “my team found Dan, who I made the film clip with, and we had already started putting it together, COVID worked in our favour, we weren’t going to be able to meet up anyway, we didn’t need a heap of people needing to be in a room together, so it just fell into place”. The single and visual have been hugely successful, with the important message of, “things are weird right now, and if you’re not fine, that’s ok, reach out and talk to someone”
The process of recording and releasing music is slightly different than previous music G Flip has released. Talking about the process of working from home, she explains that “My home studio is set up permanently, I’ve got a mini production desk, ten guitars, and a couple of drum kits. I have everything I need to create tunes, so it’s awesome”
A key difference though is that normally when releasing a single, she would be on the road. She muses that “I’d release a song, play it to people and then have them shout the words back at me, because they can learn it, so um, it’s a bit different”.
One of the most popular lyrics which G laughs is aggressively screamed back at her is the line “I’ve got a crush on Steph Claire Smith” from her hit song ‘Drink Too Much’. For G, getting her now good mate, Steph to feature in her film clip was something she always knew needed to happen, with a strong belief in manifesting her goals, “I was in St. Kilda, and I saw Steph Claire Smith, and I took a secret video and just said to the camera, ‘you don’t even know this Steph, but you’re going to be in my film clip one day, and now, it happened!” laughing she adds, “she doesn’t even know I have that video, cos it’s a bit creepy”.
The Australian music and entertainment industry have certainly taken a hit throughout the pandemic; however, G believes music is a really important way for everyone to stay connected, despite physical distancing. That’s why she’s partnered with Boost Mobile to bring live music to fans while they remain at home; “It’s a weird time at the moment, everyone isn’t doing too much, and everyone is at home, so it’s important to connect.
There have been so many people supporting Australian artists for so long, who have bought tickets to events that are now cancelled, so doing stuff like this is great and Boost, they’ve been supporting Aussie artists, and it’s good to keep playing tunes even though all the tours have been postponed for a while”.
Tuning into Boost Mobiles ‘Live at 5’ with G, it was blazingly clear why she has rocketed to the top of the charts with two songs featuring on the Triple J Hottest 100 in 2018, four making the list in 2019 as well as winning the Australian Independent Record Labels Association Awards ‘Breakthrough Independent Artists of the Year’.
The Australian music and entertainment industry have certainly taken a hit throughout the pandemic; however, G believes music is a really important way for everyone to stay connected, despite physical distancing. That’s why she’s partnered with Boost Mobile to bring live music to fans while they remain at home; “It’s a weird time at the moment, everyone isn’t doing too much, and everyone is at home, so it’s important to connect.
There have been so many people supporting Australian artists for so long, who have bought tickets to events that are now cancelled, so doing stuff like this is great and Boost, they’ve been supporting Aussie artists, and it’s good to keep playing tunes even though all the tours have been postponed for a while”.
Tuning into Boost Mobiles ‘Live at 5’ with G, it was blazingly clear why she has rocketed to the top of the charts with two songs featuring on the Triple J Hottest 100 in 2018, four making the list in 2019 as well as winning the Australian Independent Record Labels Association Awards ‘Breakthrough Independent Artists of the Year’.
Her casual way of interacting with her 128k Instagram followers, 19.1k YouTube fans and the thousands that sell out her concerts is reflected in the way she explains her choice of Usher’s ‘Burn’ as her cover during the IGTV performance; “I know the lyrics and used to love singing this song, and I still do”.
She is beautifully refreshing and dorky during her performance, asking about one of her hits, ‘Lover’, “How does it go again?” before transforming into a musician with the ability to bring you to your knees with the raw relevance and profoundness of her songs.
When asked about the role of Music in her life, especially now G reflects that “Music is such a joy and a joy in people’s lives. Sometimes I feel really sad, and then I listen to a song, and it can change my mood like the flip of a switch”.
With thousands of Aussie’s losing their entire livelihoods as a result of COVID-19, G reminds us it’s important to remember that “it’s not just the artists, it’s the roadies, the band members, booking agents, the venues who have us play there, the security guards for those events. We’ve been hit really hard by this pandemic”.
Her casual way of interacting with her 128k Instagram followers, 19.1k YouTube fans and the thousands that sell out her concerts is reflected in the way she explains her choice of Usher’s ‘Burn’ as her cover during the IGTV performance; “I know the lyrics and used to love singing this song, and I still do”.
She is beautifully refreshing and dorky during her performance, asking about one of her hits, ‘Lover’, “How does it go again?” before transforming into a musician with the ability to bring you to your knees with the raw relevance and profoundness of her songs.
When asked about the role of Music in her life, especially now G reflects that “Music is such a joy and a joy in people’s lives. Sometimes I feel really sad, and then I listen to a song, and it can change my mood like the flip of a switch”.
With thousands of Aussie’s losing their entire livelihoods as a result of COVID-19, G reminds us it’s important to remember that “it’s not just the artists, it’s the roadies, the band members, booking agents, the venues who have us play there, the security guards for those events. We’ve been hit really hard by this pandemic”.
So how does G Flip stay inspired to create new music when the world is pretty much at a standstill? A big inspiration in her life is her long-term partner, Jemma, who is currently stuck in Japan due to COVID-19 restrictions; “I roll with my emotions, I’m always very truthful in my songs. I write a lot about my relationship, nearly every single song I’ve written has been about her and me.
We are going through a tough time right now where she is in Japan, and we don’t know the next time we are going to see each other; it could be next year.
Right now I’ve got that to write about, I was writing a song yesterday about growing up and moving out because that’s my situation and I was like far out, I must be a child, in my mid-20s and I need to become an adult now”. She explains that she always finds something to write about because “it’s just my story, how I’m feeling, what’s going on this week, next week…Am I sad? Am I happy? Am I drunk and I’m writing a song in my room after coming home at 3 am?” she laughs. G Flip’s story will continue in 2020, she is set to play at Splendour in the Grass festival coming up in October as well as more music to be released over the coming months. Until then, you can watch acoustic performances of her album ‘About Us’ as well as snippets of unreleased music via her YouTube channel and social media.
You can stay up to date with the Live at 5 initiative by Boost Mobile on their Instagram by following the link below
