Thursday night, New York slipped through a hidden hinge at The Speakeasy at The Gin Mill, and the room remembered its old secrets. Past the heavy wooden door, the air held a hush like contraband – amber lights on tin ceilings, glassware whispering down the bar – at the center of it, dodie. It didn’t need to be sold out; it was meant to feel chosen. After four years without a long-play, this was less a comeback than a quiet key turning in a familiar lock.

Intimacy didn’t crowd; it concentrated. We pressed close to the stage, phones down, eyes up, QR codes winking from tabletops with a vinyl sweepstakes and a prompt for questions. The promise was an exclusive first listen to Not For Lack Of Trying, out October 3, but the night refused every PR posture. It felt like returning to a friend’s living room after too much time apart, the kind of reunion where you don’t perform your life; you pass it gently back and forth.

dodie opened on a barstool beside fans, an Arnold Palmer in hand that she joked was far too strong and making her chatty; an invitation to have a conversation. The ice clinked, the roof softened. She queued three new songs – then, at the last second, swapped the closer for something brighter, wanting the room to leave uplifted. Between tracks, she unraveled the stories in a voice that made even the bruised parts sound held, then sipped her drink among us as the melodies floated overhead like lanterns.

This isn’t the ukulele-confession you think you know. Not For Lack Of Trying drifted toward something more spectral: ambient edges, spacious arrangements, a luminous hush that suggests rooms within rooms. The care shows. It’s stitched from years since 2021, lived-in and deliberate, evolution worn lightly but unmistakably. The songs feel like windows thrown open in late afternoon; you hear where she’s been, you feel where she’s going.

The formal Q&A lasted a minute before dissolving into conversation. Hands went up, answers unfurled, and it stopped being “crowd engagement” and became catching up. Then, she lifted an acoustic from the floor and tried a few new pieces live for the first time – with a shy smile, she admitted they weren’t perfectly mastered, but they landed with the ease of someone stepping back into her natural altitude. For the finale, we voted; she crossed to the piano. Chairs emptied, people slid to the floor, knees tucked, faces upturned. The room held still in reverence and never once felt precious.

By the end, the line between artist and audience had blurred to nothing. We hadn’t watched a performance so much as participated in a return. The room was respectful, fully present, and you could feel how necessary this felt to people – like breath they’d been saving. I left thinking about listening the way you tend a candle: low lights, door closed, Not For Lack Of Trying queued for the kind of quiet where lyrics find every heartstring you didn’t know you had.