Play Me (stylized in all caps) is the third solo studio album by the American musician Kim Gordon, released on March 13, 2026, via Matador Records. Like her previous album The Collective (2024), it was produced by Justin Raisen.
Play Me is Gordon's third album in collaboration with producer Justin Raisen. It was recorded in Raisen's home studio.
Musically, Play Me is an album that relies primarily on Gordon's trap vocals, Raisen's industrial textures, and trip hop beats. Lyrically, Gordon focuses on aspects of modern life, such as U.S. politics and the rise of AI.
On "Busy Bee", Dave Grohl makes an appearance, playing drums on top of sped-up dialogue between Gordon and Free Kitten bandmate Julia Cafritz. The dialogue was taken from an episode of MTV Beach House that the pair guest-hosted in the 1990s.
On June 13, 2025, Gordon released "ByeBye25!", a reworking of the single "Bye Bye" from her 2024 album The Collective, with updated lyrics based on words flagged by the second Trump administration. It was accompanied with a black-and-white music video showing Gordon walking through a construction site. Proceeds from the single and associated T-shirt went to Noise for Now, a non-profit organization based on reproductive rights. Although it appears as a track on Play Me, it had been released as a standalone single.
Play Me was announced on January 14, 2026, with its release date, track listing, label, and official lead single "Not Today". Kate and Laura Mulleavy, known as the founders of Rodarte, directed the music video in which Gordon stars in a custom tulle dress that the Mulleavys designed for her. The track features Gordon singing, something she had not done in years on her records. On February 11, Gordon released the second single "Dirty Tech", a trap song with lyrics inspired by the rise of AI. Moni Haworth directed its music video, starring Gordon in an abandoned office space. Then on March 10, the title track was released with a music video directed by Barnaby Clay, and Gordon announced dates for an upcoming tour in North America and Europe spanning April to July 2026.
The review aggregator Any Decent Music gave the album a weighted average score of 7.5 out of 10 from twenty-four critic scores.
Victoria Segal of Mojo magazine gave Play Me four stars out of five and said Gordon "still sound[s] like an artist whose nerve endings are uninsulated, whose desire to create remains explosive". In another four-star review for the NME, Andrew Trendell described the record as "a left turn" in relation to her previous solo records, adding it "has no place being this jarring yet pleasurable from any 'rock' artist, let alone at 72". In Classic Rock magazine, Emma Johnston said that the album's "unpredictability" and "sense of anxiety" was "entirely fitting with the era we're in", and in Beats Per Minute, John Amen gave the album an 83% and opined that in a time of "chaos and unpredictability", Gordon chose to "embrace it... [with] unflagging allure". Paste Grant Sharples lauded Gordon's ability to use humor to both critique and mock the people in power, delivered in such a way that "never comes across as Resistance-core pedantry".
Writing for The Line of Best Fit, Devin Birse thought the album was "at its most interesting" when it was not as easily categorized into a specific genre, highlighting "Not Today" in particular. In a four-star review, JR Moores of Record Collector compared Gordon's observational lyricism to the late Mark E. Smith and described her approach as having "a first-draft feel" that succeeds in allowing room for interpretation. Joe Muggs of The Arts Desk similarly commented that its songs felt like "first drafts or even an improv session", but they gave Play Me two stars out of five, saying it "[felt] like an unfinished experiment". Muggs also said that while Gordon leans further into elements that made The Collective a good record, they criticized her vocal performance as "trapped between deadpan and declamatory".
Credits are adapted from the vinyl liner notes, except where noted.