Gia Woods’ is on a mission - to make lesbians dance: Born and raised in LA, lesbian artist Gia Woods pulls inspiration from her upbringing in the city of dreams to create her own flavor of sapphic dance pop
Text and interview by Pedro Paulo Furlan
Photography by Thomas Angeli
2 PM, São Paulo / 10 AM, Los Angeles. Gia Woods first got the public’s ears in 2015, when she decided to come out to everyone, including family and friends, through song. The track, called “Only A Girl”, got major attention in an era where people were listening to “Girls like Girls”, for example.
“That was like really challenging and crazy and I still don't know how I did that, so casually”, she says about her first release.
Now, 9 years after that, Gia has four EP’s, a ton of singles, and a following that recognizes her for her, clearly lesbian-themed, dance tracks. Sitting down to talk to me, Gia looks as if she’s in her element, pop-star aura and certainty behind every single answer.
Coming off of the release of “Your Engine”, her latest EP, last year, she explains to me that every single one of her projects is born out of a different concept - that’s always her first step with music, creating the world where the music lives. “I think about the concept first, like, the overall concept - maybe the name isn't for sure, but I need to know what this entire project is about”, she tells Vetor.
“I feel like it's really hard to just write and then stitch all the songs together and be like, 'this is an EP', I've never done that, and I don't know how to do that, I have to tell a story of whatever I'm going through”
The themes and sounds of Gia Woods
Starting with her first project back in 2020, “CUT SEASON”, Gia tells me that that was a hard time in her life, so “it only made sense” for the EP to feel like a darker version. Inspired by the rock music she grew up listening to, like Radiohead, she wanted to write music that felt really like part of it’s own world - “I was like 'We gotta make this sexy, but also nostalgic'”.
“I got that out of my system, and then the pandemic happened”, she tells about the road to her second project - the EP duology “Heartbreak County” - “I felt like everyone wanted to get the hell out of the house and dance”. Inspired by her growing up in LA, Gia Woods wanted to create a project inspired by the city of angels, but dividing it in two sides, the darker more serious side, and then, the grittier and, in her words, “sluttier” side.
“Los Angeles is like the city where people come to make their dreams happen, but also where they come for their dreams to die”.
Photography by Thomas Angeli
On the first volume, Gia explored the ways in which “fame is idolized”, with songs like “Fame Kills”, also her own relationship with the inner workings of the city, in “Next Girlfriend”, for example. On the second EP, though, the artist really started experimenting with dance music, creating tracks like “Lesbionic” and “Disco Heart”, and narrating the phases of a breakup with danceable beats and quick BPM’s.
Finding herself inside dance music, her latest EP was born out of a will to talk about “what motivates you, what gets you going every day” - and, so, “Your Engine” was born. The title was inspired by a phrase in Italian (“‘Tuo mottore’ - I thought it sounded so hot”) spoken by Simona Tabasco and Beatrice Grannò, actresses from “The White Lotus”, “I was obsessed, found them so cute”.
“What's the reason you wake up and do what you do? Is it a person? Is it your dreams? Is it a heartbreak or someone you can't get out of your mind? I think it reflects whatever you feel when you listen to it, I was really inspired by that”.
“Queerness will always be a central theme to Gia”
Hearing Gia talk about the worlds behind her projects, one starts to wonder how she manages to include so much of herself in each one, never fading behind a character. Being a lesbian, she finds it really important to always outline that in her songs - always sticking true to her influences and tastes.
“I think I have an interesting perspective, I wanna make lesbians get out of their box and instead of crying so much, also dance, you know what I mean?”.
As soon as the pandemic was over, Gia needed to dance, so, she started exploring deeper into the queer party scene in Los Angeles, quickly finding herself in underground raves and really queer environments. Falling deeply in love with a more electronic sound, the singer explains, “I love finding cool DJ's that are bringing a different kind of music to our community - it's such a different culture that we all should experiment more with”.
All the inspirations that came after the pandemic evolved into her two latest EP’s. Highlighting “Lesbionic”, one of her biggest hits, Gia says that the song was supposed to make people wanna go out and dance to it, but, it holds a deeper meaning as well.
“I feel like there's so much music about men sexualizing women, 24/7, and it's always done in a dirty way, so I wanted to hear about women talking about women's bodies”.
Photography by Thomas Angeli
Written in 30 minutes, “Lesbionic” was created as one of the queerest nods to her sexuality and her lesbian identity in her discography - “It was so natural, it's crazy, we were literally just spitting out melodies, and then we were like envisioning a lesbian party”.
Besides that track, though, queerness bleeds into all of her discography, “Your Engine” itself is also one of the highlights. Written in a writing camp with all queer people in Australia, organized by none other than Troye Sivan, the title track to Gia’s latest EP is a fruit of a community effort - “it was actually the most cool thing I've done in my career”.
During the camp, Gia tells me, she knew what she wanted to do with the song, but, it was the synergy with other queer people that made her be sure of what it should sound like. Saying that the producer whipped up the beat “in like three minutes”, Gia and the cowriters wrote all the lyrics inspired by the partying they had been doing during the trip.
“Going out and clubbing with Troye and the people we wrote with was so cool and interesting, the queer community there [in Australia] was even bigger in some ways than in LA, there's so many different kinds of people”.
“We need to go out, because that would be so fun”
Always writing with her own feelings in mind - “I don't really go to therapy, so, this is my therapy” - Gia Woods matches up the themes of her music and projects with her overall vibe at the moment. And, right now, she wants to party.
“I think it's not that I only wanna be the dance pop girl, but I feel like that's what I'm going through currently. I'm so true to what I go through”.
To her, dance music is about making people dance and forget the problems of life for a little. Highlighting the importance of queer-led party spots and raves, Gia notes that all those events are a way of “showing others that they're being old-fashioned” and encouraging people to “get with the times”, when it comes to queer people.
Photography by Thomas Angeli
“I'm always trying to bring everyone together and I think that's how our community naturally is”, she says, bringing up her newest experiences at, specially, underground raves. Taking it all in as inspiration for her music, Gia tells me that being in environments like that makes her actually want to experiment more with her sound and, at all times, discover new things about what kind of art she can make.
“I feel the most empowered making a song that's celebrating us, that really makes you wanna go out and dance to it, or pregame to it, or get an Uber and be wreckless, heads out of car windows, you know?”.
While talking about partying and the underground scene, I make sure to tell Gia about how things work in Brazil, specially in São Paulo. With a blossoming queer scene when it comes to parties, highlighting the trans DJ’s and musicians responsible for the nightly soundtracks, São Paulo has places like Mamba Negra, Sangra Muta, Lâmina and tons of others where queerness, music and partying walk hand in hand.
Finishing up our chat, Gia promises to make her way to Brazil, saying that Brazilians “really do your homework, you understand music in such a way”. Adding up afterward: “It's really rare that there's a culture that really loves music and you guys do, I need to get out there”.
“Okay, so, it’s settled, when I come to Brazil, we need to go out, that would be so fun” - and I’m holding her to that promise.