'I've Missed Connection & Community': How 'Minecraft' Helped Shape Woodes' Album

Growing up in Townsville, video games were pretty foreign to me for a long time. I lived on a national park; the only daughter of a park ranger father and marine biologist mother, so by necessity I spent most of my time drawing, painting, sculpting, playing music, or simply playing with the many animals around the house. Sometimes we even babysat problem crocodiles on their way to being relocated north, so it would be my job to go and hose them off when the North Queensland humidity got a bit high. You know, normal pet stuff.

I was also into books. I was one of those kids in the line at the local book store, waiting for the latest Harry Potter to go on sale; dressed head-to-toe as a witch. I guess by looking at the latest Woodes press shots, it’s fair to say not much has changed…

It wasn’t until high school that my house got its very first PC and I became obsessed with The Sims. As well as designing some excellent gardens, one of the main things I loved about it was how different background music was attached to different parts of the game. One song for designing the house, one song for creating the sims… as someone who really likes finding out how things work, it began my interest how music and the game connected from scene to scene.

It was around this time that some friends got Xbox’s and I went to a couple of LAN parties, but since it wasn’t really a part of my upbringing, the whole experience felt novel. It also felt, for the most part, overly male focused.

When I was 12 I discovered I could record and produce the songs I’d been writing (and hearing from places like The Sims) myself, just as I’d read Imogen Heap had done for her song Hide & Seek. It really excited me, and thus my computer games shifted from The Sims to a different program - Logic. It’s a music software program which came with a mic. Since I already played piano and percussion, I started to experiment.

One of my best friends and I made a couple EPs in his bedroom. My first song we recorded had a sample of a school playground with kids shouting and playing, which we warped and turned into an atmospheric swarm that pulsed in the background of the track. Experimentation and sampling real experiences and every day sounds has been a backbone to my production and arrangements. I think that comes from my love of soundtracks, noting the placement of sounds and the sound design. It’s so rare to have only a couple of layers in a Woodes song, instead if you dig deeper there are swords, gates, backing vocals, reversed sounds, sprinklers. Producing music often feels like a game, I really love it.

As an adult I moved from Townsville to Melbourne to study composition, and from there I immersed myself in a brand-new world of share houses. Here, I became friends with coders, VFX designers, architects, yoga teachers and film makers. In each house, in each friendship, I found a lot to learn about creative professions beyond my own musical experience. In one of those share-houses we started a server in a game called Minecraft. It began as something fun, but quickly built among our friendship group. There was a community of about 20 of us, from a range of backgrounds. What I really liked was that you could hang out in a digital world, and apply lateral thinking whilst discussing normal everyday stuff. It felt very accessible and communal, having friends log in from around the world. I liked it as a way of breaking up my day from music. Like a portal into another place entirely.

Which brings us to 2020 - the eve of finishing up my debut record Crystal Ball, my biggest project yet. It has 10 tracks, filled anthemic choirs, boat horns, whirly tubes, wizard sounds, tea cups, old pianos and a string quartet. But come March, everything I’d spent time planning around the release all changed in about a week. The initial shock of every show and idea being cancelled really threw me, thinking of how we could adapt in a time where there was no room for planning the same way anymore. I’ve really missed connection and community. I’ve missed hanging out with friends in person. I’ve missed playing shows and visiting my family.

And so, for the first time in a couple years, one evening, me and my friends jumped back onto the old share house Minecraft server.

Friends who are now as far flung as Berlin, Wollongong and Perth united for some missions, being able to share their experiences of COVID in their area, whilst building an underground lair. It sparked something, and I realised it would be a really neat way for me and the “Woodlings” to hang out. Since I was at home for the foreseeable future, it was also the perfect time to dive into a new big project. Minecraft was back! I decided to launch my album from a world which we created inside it. So… the Minecraft Crystal Ball Woodes Project began.

I reached out to Splendour In The Grass Minecraft creator/film maker, Reuben Gore. Since the album is called Crystal Ball we decided to create a village with a central Crystal Orb in the centre, with mountains & buildings all around it. In the lead up to releasing my record, fans can jump in by pre-ordering, and can hang out, or go on adventures, or build a retreat, or be a part of some fun album-specific projects we have in mind.

I’ve found a lot of joy signing in, creating little farm lands, tinkering away at small details, escaping the “real world” for a little while, and catching up with my online community simultaneously.

Some of my favourite parts about touring are the conversations with fans after the shows, and often those conversations have to be cut short due to load out or early starts. I’ve really enjoyed getting to hang out from the comfort of home and spend time with people with no time limit, which has also been enhanced by live streaming some of the builds on Twitch. It’s an international platform that has been primarily used for live streaming gaming, but there is also a growing music community where artists like Disclosure, Hana and Eilish Gilligan do live streams of making music from scratch from home.

Spaces like these are so special because audiences can watch you make things, can be a part of a project, can share what they are making, or can just hang out. The Twitch and Minecraft communities I am have been a space I could go to and connect, and create. It’s a really great place for community, collaboration and escapism; the three things the Woodes Project has always been about.

Crystal Ball is due for release on 2 October. Woodes has just released her latest single, Euphoria, which you can check out below.