Review: dodie – ‘Cool Girl’ and ‘Rainbow’

Dorothy Clark, the YouTube musical sensation better known as Dodie or dodie (as she has conventionalised it with the lower-case ‘d’ and goes by the name as a singer), has been releasing original songs on YouTube since 2009 when the singer-songwriter was at the tender age of 16.

‘Cool Girl’

Ahead of the release of debut album Build A Problem in March 2021, the now 25-year-old dodie has released the first single, Cool Girl, as a teaser of what is to come in her upcoming and hotly-anticipated album.

I can remember the first time I heard a dodie original as if it were yesterday. It was called Braces to Lipstick; a YouTube original song dedicated to her best friend as a birthday present. In fact, it wasn’t yesterday at all, it was six years ago in my Sixth Form common room when one of my best friends showed me a singer they “thought I’d like”. Six years later and I’ve seen dodie live a total of four times, cried at every album release, and, to top it all off, shared many great hugs and laughs with her after shows at her stage door.

In fact, as I’m writing this review, a giant poster of dodie’s last EP Human stares down at my monitor. While I strive to make this review as critical as any other, it may also include a just amount of admiration and fangirl-style idolisation of the singer.

After three EPs – Intertwined (2016), You (2017), and Human (2019) – the time has finally come for dodie to release her debut album Build A Problem, set for a release date of 5 March 2021.

Dodie built up to the announcement of the long-awaited album over the course of three weeks on her second YouTube channel ‘doddlevloggle’ by knitting a different letter per video. Dodie ultimately kept fans waiting in anticipation for what the cosy anagram could possibly be spelling out. 

“In ‘Cool Girl’, dodie stays faithful to her always relatable themes of feeling every emotion in even the most insipid and everyday experiences.”

The first track of the new album to be released, Cool Girl, made its debut on BBC Radio 1 on Radio 1’s Futadio ure Sounds with Annie Mac as Annie Mac’s Hottest Record in the World on 19 October 2020, and the single was simultaneously released on all mainstream streaming services and music providers.

Though this was its first official release, the track had featured throughout dodie’s ALOSIA (a lot of songs in April) series on the doddlevloggle channel – where in April, you guessed it, in a series of videos dodie released a lot of new songs and short musical snippets that she had reimagined or written over the early days of first UK lockdown. Tracks from ALOSIA are also featured on the deluxe versions of the Build A Problem album.

“dodie shows us that no matter how small or nonchalant, there is no shame in feeling deeply and experiencing the emotions that have been brought to the surface.”

Cool Girl is beautiful and, of course, features not only dodie’s authentic and iconic style but also stays faithful to her always relatable themes of feeling every emotion in even the most insipid and everyday experiences.

Throughout the single, dodie throws what some may interpret as quite dramatic reactions to an encounter with a person that she had romantic feelings for. However, as most of us would know, there are a million and one emotions interlaced into these everyday encounters and dodie shows us that no matter how small or nonchalant, there is no shame in feeling deeply and experiencing the emotions that have been brought to the surface.

“‘Cool Girl’ explores the pressures that are put on us as young women, especially the weight of societal expectations on us when it comes to impressing men.”

This is something that I have always loved about dodie and what I think keeps me so entranced by her as an artist. I feel like we grew up in parallel. Whatever I was feeling one week, an original song about something incredibly similar would be uploaded around the same time – which is incredibly comforting as a young person internalising all of your thoughts that you have now come to learn that you are not alone with.

Cool Girl explores the pressures that are put on us as young women, especially the weight of societal expectations on us when it comes to impressing men, touching on emotions similar to those that I have experienced. Though dodie is as delicate and haunting with her beautiful head-voice as ever, you cannot help but hear the power behind her words when she denounces the idea of changing who she is to fit in with the popular trends and attitudes.

Amongst the hype of Build A Problem, a UK tour has also been announced which is planned to take place in September 2021 -COVID-19 permitting.

‘Rainbow’

As the release of dodie’s debut album fast approaches, we have been blessed with another early track release: Rainbow.

Dodie first released Rainbow on her main YouTube channel, doddleoddle, in 2018 and it was, unsurprisingly, an immediate fan favourite. The track was described by dodie herself in the video description: “this is a song I wrote around the shame lgbtq+ people go through, and therefore the importance of ‘pride’ and the rainbow and flags etc and just how needed and helpful it all is to combat that feeling.”

“dodie encompasses the difficult experience of hearing people who discredit, condemn, or simply do not believe in LGBTQ+ feelings or relationships.”

Lyrically, the song lays bare the emotion and conflict felt by many LGBTQ+ people. In one verse, we hear dodie say: “I didn’t think it fair / I was not to be trusted / Oh, how can I be proud of / What a million people shout at me I’m not”

“So please step inside my soul / I’d love to watch you gasp / You’d understand in minutes / And I’d like to think you’d miss it / ‘Cause so would I”

In this latter section alone, dodie encompasses not only the difficult experience of hearing people who discredit, condemn, or simply do not believe in LGBTQ+ feelings or relationships but also a wish that everyone could understand how magical an experience of permitting and embracing the sentiment that all love is equal could be. Dodie also includes a nod towards the common misconception that bisexual people cannot “be trusted”, a line which is presumably important to dodie as a bisexual woman.

This track is also extra special as it is one of six songs on the debut album that have been accompanied by a beautiful thirteen-piece string section that dodie herself composed for.

After the release of Rainbow on YouTube, the snippet of the single became incredibly important to many fans that could relate to the feelings engendered by the “shame lgbtq+ people go through” that dodie penned the heartfelt song for. So much so that even though Rainbow has only just been released as a recorded track, it has been on dodie’s setlist at gigs since its YouTube release.

“Idolising someone who can put into words a plethora of feelings that many in the LGBTQ+ community may struggle to go through alone is a cathartic experience for some of dodie’s fans.”

Played to a backdrop of all of the colours of the rainbow, dodie would sing an exert of the track accompanied by her phenomenal cellist, Sophie English, before the lights changed to the iconic pink, purple, and blue of the bisexual pride flag before dodie fades into She.

She was dodie’s first track about her experiences as a part of the LGBTQ+ community and, ever since, it has provided much comfort and support to her loyal fanbase. Idolising someone who can put into words a plethora of feelings that many in the LGBTQ+ community may struggle to go through alone is a cathartic experience for some of dodie’s fans, some of whom especially rely on the incredibly special and safe space that dodie’s gigs provide each tour.

Caitlin Parr

Featured image courtesy of Side Stage Collective on Flickr. Image licence can be found here. No changes were made to this image.