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Gatlin Thornton is on a spiritual journey, one you can follow along with through her music.<\/p>\n
The Nashville based artist, who goes by the stage name Gatlin, describes herself as a \u201ctoned down Maggie Rogers,\u201d layering modern pop production with folk lyrics, her ethereal voice draped over mystifying melodies of soft, thumping drums and guitar.<\/p>\n
Gatlin walked a winding road trying to decipher what genre suited her style best. She initially gravitated toward Christian Contemporary, inspired by years she spent singing in church choir. In high school, a cowboy boot-wearing phase heralded a shift toward country music. Now, the 21-year-old\u2019s newfound love is that of modern folk-pop, a niche she discovered upon moving to Nashville, a city that\u2019s had a profound impact not only on her musical direction, but her personal journey.<\/p>\n
Gatlin relocated from her native Orlando, Florida to Nashville in 2017 to study religion and the arts at Belmont University, but after two years, she quit and became a songwriter full time. She got a taste of the city\u2019s pop scene when she began working with a diverse range of songwriters, proving to the longtime pop snob that she doesn\u2019t have a distaste for all <\/em>pop music – in fact, she has a gift for creating her own style of the genre. “That time in my life, I learned the most because I was writing with someone new every day,\u201d she tells Audiofemme <\/em>via phone interview.<\/p>\n