Indy Yelich Gets Candid About ‘Trying to Make Sense’ of Sister Lorde’s Fame as She Releases New EP (Exclusive)

Indy Yelich was precisely 5 years old when she began her songwriting career.

When she wasn’t falling asleep to the sounds of her parents’ dinner parties, the singer-songwriter was filling the pages of her journal with “cringe songs” that she used to write. Eventually, she’d sing in choirs. But the Auckland native waited years to dive into the art of songwriting.

“I had to figure out how to write a song, how to produce, how to get my point across,” Yelich, 26, tells PEOPLE over Zoom from Long Island.

However, Yelich never stopped writing. In fact, she became a poet, publishing two books — 2018’s Sticky Notes and 2022’s Dudette. “The medium is just one thing. I’ve always known how to write, I’ve always known how to articulate, but morphing something into songwriting is a bigger, longer journey,” she says.

For Yelich, the transition was “divine timing.” It wasn’t until 2022 that she released her first single “Threads,” and it would be another year until she’d share her eponymous debut EP.

Since then, Yelich has been songwriting between New York and Los Angeles, sharpening her craft for her sophomore EP Fame Is a Bedroom, a five-track collection of hazy, soul-baring synth-and-string-filled tracks that fans of Gracie Abrams, Olivia Rodrigo and Ethel Cain won’t be able to resist.

Now signed to Mom + Pop, the road to Yelich’s latest EP took roughly a year. She began the process back in 2023, with “Savior,” which she recalls “was agony to finish.” The other songs followed over the course of 2024 and 2025. “I write about my real life as it happens,” says Yelich. “So, it’s almost jarring to put this out because some of the stuff is too fresh.”

For Yelich, Fame Is a Bedroom is a lush, alt-pop exploration in coming-of-age, grappling with the situations she found herself in during her youth and the sometimes difficult emotions that have shaped her as she’s matured. Throughout the project, she reflects on power imbalances in relationships, the grief of a toxic friendship, making out with guys in dive bars to get over an ex and the intimacy of having a relationship with her sister, Lorde, who is also so connected to the spotlight.

“Even when my sister essentially belongs to the public in a way — she could be the most famous person in the room — and yet, she’s the one that knows me the best,” says Yelich. “It’s trusting that personal relationship and sisterhood when there’s a public thing involved, really.”

Below, Yelich speaks to PEOPLE about what shaped her latest EP, if she’ll ever perform with her sister and who she dreams of collaborating with in the future.

PEOPLE: Tell me about the inspiration behind the title of your EP Fame Is a Bedroom.

INDY YELICH: Well, Fame Is a Bedroom really is my emotional interior. It was the conversations I had behind closed doors. A lot of it is also, fame influenced my desire to be understood. It’s really an ode to the intimacy of sisterhood and the distance of fame when you have a sister that you love who’s in the public. 

PEOPLE: Something you sing about on the EP — specifically on “Savior” — is being in an age gap relationship. How did that filter into the music, and how did you heal from that experience?

YELICH: A lot of this [EP] is really around my frontal lobe developing. It draws from my very real life. So, it does feel like it’s sad, but it’s a rite of passage to really date someone and have that Mr. B experience. Then, my frontal lobe developed, and I saw the relationship for what it really was. For example, “Savior.” All of these tracks are a sonic farewell to something, whether it’s letting go of that relationship, the emotional history behind it or other things.

But I feel you can tell my penmanship has grown a lot more because of the things I went through when I was younger. [The ages of] 21 to 26 [are] extremely different. [The relationship] ended when I was 25, but even so, a year is a long time.

PEOPLE: There are clear themes within the music and specifically about falling in love with your friends. Can you tell me about that and how it it surfaces on the EP?

YELICH: “Sail Away,” it’s about a codependent friendship that I think a lot of [people have as] a formative experience, and female friendships truly can be the most painful. Romantic relationships aside, I know so many women who have had these experiences — especially with a woman — it’s in high school or friendship. It’s not necessarily just queer, but it’s this toxic, codependent friendship. For me, it was two layers, in the sense of realizing that I was falling in love with a friend and also putting them on a pedestal and listening to all of their similar problems. “Sail Away” is the one I don’t listen to because it’s still quite painful, and I want it to be fast, vengeful and sassy. Homoerotic friendships, there’s nothing like it.

PEOPLE: Is that person still in your life?

YELICH: Not at this current moment, but [they are a] truly wonderful person. I definitely look back on it now, and think a lot of it was on me in a sense of not being able to emotionally deal with it anymore. But [they are a] truly incredible person, so it’s hard to talk about this. Fame Is a Bedroom is the art of departure from some of these formative relationships. It’s cathartic, but it’s my real life, so it’s really hard to draw from my real life.

PEOPLE: Were there specific artists or albums that really inspired this EP?

YELICH: I was very influenced by the honesty of Holly Humberstone. Obviously, I’m always influenced by my sister in some form. Not so much sonically, but just her honesty and her ability to enunciate these things. I truly love Mk.gee. The Japanese House. Chappell Roan, big time. “Casual” was quite a big one. I was very inspired by Bon Iver, Gracie [Abrams] a little bit I was really inspired by this alternative sound, I think. Not a coming-of-age sound, but a mid-20s sad guitar, synth and a loss.

PEOPLE: Who are the songwriters you’ve been working with?

YELICH: I wrote “Grace” with Skyler Stonestreet and Nick Monson who did a lot of Reneé Rapp [songs], who did some Lady Gaga stuff. I wrote “Savior with one of my best friends who wrote “East Coast” and “Threads.” I worked with Annie Schindel, who wrote “Red Wine Supernova” by Chappell Roan. So, there’s actually been a lot of ties to some of my favorite artists. 

PEOPLE: Your sister’s album Virgin was recently released. When did you first hear the record, and what’s your favorite song on it?

YELICH: Obviously, I’m very proud. I’ve been hearing it for about a year. I’ve heard it in most of its forms. I heard it when it was just starting to be made. I was in the next room for a lot of it. We’d have a lot of sleepovers. I’d stay at her apartment a lot. It felt more comforting to be together when you’re writing about your life. I knew from the start “Shapeshifter” was the one. It’s like crack. She would show me a lot of versions of “David,” “Current Affairs” and “Favorite Daughter,” and I would make her leave the room. I would put a blindfold on, and I would listen to her and take it in. 

This is the first record that I’ve really been alongside her when she’s been doing it. [There’s] just a lot of sister comfort because we’re [around] the same age now, essentially. A few months ago, I remember looking her in the eyes — and we were sitting on the kitchen floor listening to some of the things — and I said, “This is going to change your life. I know this, not even as a sister, I feel it. I believe in it so much.” It’s been really cathartic, actually, to have my own journey and see her be so brave with her life. It inspires me to be so sure in my own work.

PEOPLE: How much did living in New York influence your record?

YELICH: A big amount. As you get older, you crave your childhood more. So when I go into New Zealand, I feel my most self. But I think that living in a big city where everyone is just so fearless and loud and intense inspires you to carve out all the s—, just really be intense in the emotional and creative process. It really healed me a lot. Moving to a city so young, there was already a preconceived idea of me, and there was a weight of perception, in a sense. You move to a city like New York, and no one gives a f— about where you’ve been and where you’re from. They care about who you are and what you’re doing. I think a lot of those dive bars definitely healed a lot for me, a lot of those sparse random plans, meeting my community, things like that. I would not be a songwriter if I didn’t move to New York, I think.

PEOPLE: What is the best and worst piece of advice you’ve gotten from your sister?

YELICH: I would say the roles have reversed — I give her a lot of advice. It’s funny, she has started calling me to ask my opinion, and I think that’s really quite incredible. I would say the best piece of advice that she’s given me is [about] advocating for your own music. 

I don’t think she gives me bad advice. The worst advice she’d give me is, “Maybe don’t have another drink.” And I would say like, “Well….” I’ll have one more cocktail, and then I’ve met someone, or I don’t know. I don’t think sisters give each other bad advice. They’re very intuitive. I give her some freaking good advice. She gives me some, too.

PEOPLE: Who do you dream of collaborating with at this point in your career?

YELICH: I love Mk.gee big time. I love Ethel Cain truly so much. That new song, “F— Me Eyes” is a big song. I don’t necessarily know how that would look, but even just involvement [with] Olivia Rodrigo, Chappell Roan, Mk.gee, Dijon, Holly Humberstone [or] The Japanese House.

PEOPLE: You’ve released two EPs thus far. What comes next? Do you plan to release a full-length album?

YELICH: That would be the dream, but ultimately it’s just one foot in front of the other. I signed with Mom + Pop for this EP. A few more singles I would say, but I’m not sure what that looks like. I’m writing in L.A. next week, so we’ll see. 

PEOPLE: Do you envision yourself taking a similar path to your sister or is something completely separate appealing?

YELICH: One can never follow a path that isn’t theirs. For example, “Up In Flames” just came out, and I noticed that there’s a level of connection that may have been there before, but I’ve noticed a lot of people are like, “That’s my favorite song of yours.” 

I’m pretty hungry to keep writing and creating, but I think that the right answer is, if the music resonates, then everything else will come. For me, I think about the future so much, but then I think to myself, “Well, all I can do is my job, in the sense of figure out my creative voice, write the right music, and then the rest will follow.”

PEOPLE: Would you and your sister ever perform on stage together?

YELICH: I mean, you never know. Because [the EP] does touch on some of these topics, it’s just stepping into that pull slowly. It’s just being true to myself emotionally, writing a body of work I love and making my own. It’s really important to me to make my own name. Your name is your currency. I know my journey. I know my emotional history. Never say never. That sounds like a dream. At this moment, it’s so important for me to be in this work, and truly it’s mine.

Fame Is a Bedroom is out now.