I had to give myself time to adequately absorb the tracks I didn't know from prerelease, and basically I think it's a really good album that's a few songs short of great. I agree that a few of the folkier tracks don't register very strongly —– "Revolution" and "We're in Love" in particular — and I like them best with a bit of a beat behind them. That said, "Emily I'm Sorry" is one of my favorite Bridgers songs period, solo or otherwise, and the other pre-release tracks plus "Satanist," "Anti-Curse," and "Cool About It" are all top-notch.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 8 April 2023 19:23 (one year ago) link
"Cool About It" is such a condensed encapsulation of their various lyrical styles and performative characters, I can't think of lines more typical of Baker, Dacus and Bridgers respectively than "Wishing you were kind enough to be cruel about it", "I came prepared for absolution if you would only ask / so I take some offense when you say 'no regrets'", and "Once I took your medication just to know what it was like / and now I have to act like I can't read your mind".
superbly otm, my favorite song here
― corrs unplugged, Tuesday, 11 April 2023 09:08 (one year ago) link
Put another way, the things that each needs to let go of in order to move on are very much in character and carefully (though not obviously so) counterposed: Baker needs to let go of her idealisation of her ex’s goodness; Dacus, her desire for fair determination as to where blame lies; Bridgers, her over-identification with her ex’s flaws.
― Tim F, Tuesday, 11 April 2023 10:07 (one year ago) link
did we ever figure out who all's in the band? Jay Som on the left here, I believe (correct me if wrong) ... the person next to the drummer looks very familiar but I can't quite place them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPYc7VC6M-Q
― alpine static, Tuesday, 25 April 2023 19:12 (one year ago) link
very confusingly they have two bassists in that performance?
the live band there is apparently jay som on bass, madden klass on drums, sarah goldstone (she plays with dacus) on keys, and tiana ohara on bass. one of the bassists moves around instruments i think for other songs?
― ufo, Tuesday, 25 April 2023 23:22 (one year ago) link
Am very much here for the extended version of 'True Blue' that will inevitably appear.
― Stars of the Lidl (Chinaski), Sunday, 7 May 2023 21:36 (one year ago) link
Nice acoustic version of Not Strong Enough from one of the Taylor Swift Nashville shows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aiL6c9Qi98
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 10 May 2023 02:39 (one year ago) link
They're playing here this summer at some weird festival that both cost hundreds of dollars and also sold out but at the same time seems like it's on the cusp of being cancelled (literally) for permitting issues.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 10 May 2023 12:13 (one year ago) link
Re:Set festival? that's their own thing too I believe, as in, they are principal organizers. Three day thing, luckily youu could get single day tickets (which I did for Palo Alto; still a bit expensive considering I don't care at all about the other people playing the same day as them)
― I? not I! He! He! HIM! (akm), Wednesday, 10 May 2023 15:10 (one year ago) link
If I understand correctly, here in Chicago they put tickets on sale before they had the requisite permits, and the permit issue still hasn't been resolved.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 10 May 2023 15:40 (one year ago) link
Also, aiui, the neighbors reallllllly don't want it. They just submitted another petition to have it blocked. Apparently largely the same group that has been working to chase festivals out of Douglass Park, they successfully stopped two other festivals at Douglass (Lyrical Lemonade, Heatwave).
If they sold tickets prior to permits, I'm sure that doesn't help their case much either. Doesn't look good with it less than two months away.
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 10 May 2023 15:56 (one year ago) link
Yeah, a lot of neighborhoods are sick of their parks and outdoor spaces being commandeered for the summer.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 10 May 2023 15:57 (one year ago) link
Which I can kind of understand, I think people got sick of seeing Grant Park blocked off for almost half of the good weather portion of the year between Lolla, the marathon, private events, etc etc and it's spreading out to other parks. It seems less about the event itself, but how they lose park access for 2+ weeks on either side of the festival as well. As much as I like seeing more festivals that aren't the Lolla behemoth pop up, I get the annoyance of prolonged park closures during our precious good weather months.
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, 10 May 2023 16:01 (one year ago) link
Yeah, like this stupid urban NASCAR boondoggle.Every week a park is shut down, that's another week people can't have picnics, graduations, sports, family reunions, just quiet time to themselves.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 10 May 2023 16:14 (one year ago) link
I totally understand that, though I did enjoy Pitchfork at Union Park last year. But I feel like that's a tension a lot of places, people using cities as playgrounds and playgrounds as party zones. Maintaining public access to public places is pretty crucial.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 10 May 2023 17:48 (one year ago) link
enjoyable acoustic version of Not Strong Enough up there, but i hope when i see them we get a full band rock version.
my song of the year so far, probably.
― alpine static, Wednesday, 10 May 2023 19:34 (one year ago) link
Simon Pegg just picked 'Salt In The Wound' as his final track on Desert Island Discs, which was surprising and great to hear. They've definitely made it now.
― brain (krakow), Sunday, 14 May 2023 11:32 (one year ago) link
Took my 15-year-old daughter to see them in London yesterday. The sound wasn't the best (I kept wanting to shout 'turn the guitars up!' like a doofus) and I felt very old and straight but that's all good it was such a lovely atmosphere. They said that, collectively, it was their biggest show so far but I've not been with a crowd that hushed and reverent for a while (which feels weird when it's a crowd of 40,000). I had an absolute blast.
― (picnic, lightning) very very frightening (Chinaski), Monday, 21 August 2023 17:06 (one year ago) link
Very much regretting not organising myself to get to one of the Halifax gigs. Edinburgh would be very much doable at short notice, but I really don't fancy that somehow.
― brain (krakow), Monday, 21 August 2023 18:26 (one year ago) link
"very old and straight" is a good way to describe how i felt when i saw them.
the LGBTQ+ percentage of the audience at the show i saw in the U.S. was many times more than any other show i've ever attended, anywhere. it was amazing to see.
― alpine static, Monday, 21 August 2023 18:52 (one year ago) link
That was a bland review upthread. I just went for a walk through the woods and everything caught up to me - just how gorgeous the atmosphere was yesterday, how that trio of people made everyone feel.
My kid came out as queer a couple of years ago and I've been on a bit of a journey with being a queer and trans ally in my work at school and well, I'm struggling to articulate how yesterday made me feel, without wanting to come across like some dumbass benevolent patriarch or whatever, but yeah, it made my goddamn heart swell.
― (picnic, lightning) very very frightening (Chinaski), Monday, 21 August 2023 19:57 (one year ago) link
I had a very similar feeling seeing them in Vancouver with trans kiddo.
― husked, tonal wails (irrational), Monday, 21 August 2023 21:43 (one year ago) link
with my trans kiddo, I mean.
Thinking about the (now locked) phoebe bridgers haters thread, and while I don't intend to relitigate the issue here, it struck me as odd to think about how bridgers frequently attracts those kinds of responses but baker and dacus largely do not. Part of that it just profile level and the fact that bridgers feels more celebrity-adjacent (dating paul mescal etc), but it's more interesting to imagine that it's also partly reflective of their diverging songwriting personas.
Of the three, bridgers' songwriting feels most obviously "gen z" to me (scare quotes intended) - that mix of deadpan and archness, both numb and emotionally needy. Like, I can imagine her letting a friend know she had just had serious surgery by writing "in the hospital, nearly met my grandma again lol", whereas baker if she sent a message at all would be like "you need to pick me up", and dacus would probably be giving her friends advice from her hospital bed without mentioning where she was. To be clear, this is not what I actually think these people would do in these circumstances, but rather what the narrator-characters of their songs imply to me.
Like that line in "cool about it" where bridgers sings "Once I took your medication to know what it was like" - which is presented as evidence for how deeply attuned to the other person and their reality she is, even though it's also a totally fucked up thing to do, and of course she knows that. Like, if the song generally is about the difficulty of walking back intimacy after a relationship ends, then bridgers' verse adds another layer: "there is no document of intimacy which is not at the same time a document of narcissism".
― Tim F, Wednesday, 30 August 2023 07:40 (one year ago) link
I got into this band the way I get into most music these days: a song on a playlist or a Discover Weekly, a tickle that becomes an itch and so on. I knew Julien from her associations with Frightened Rabbit and knew of her confessional style; I had a vague sense of Phoebe Bridgers and no knowledge of Dacus at all. I very rarely look for live stuff or interviews so had no visual sense of the band at all. It wasn't until my daughter got into them and they became this intense lockdown thing, that I filled in the character backstories and what they meant to the fans.
Since then I've developed a vicarious appreciation of the closeness of things, most of which operates outside of the music yet seems utterly inseparable from it: the characters to each other, the 'characters' to the 'real' people involved, the relationship to the fans. Your second paragraph speaks to this: how porous the boundaries seem, how the band seem to blur the line between drama and 'real life'. Seeing them live cemented all of this and I wasn't really prepared for the emotional wallop of it and what it meant for me and the people there. The trio appeared on stage very briefly, at the end of Muna's set and it was like 30,000 people spontaneously burst into tears. It was extraordinary but also contributed to an ongoing feeling that this simply isn't sustainable; that they're playing that is so combustible it's bound to explode at some point. Julien is too damaged. Phoebe is just a chaos engine. Lucy will tire of being the third who walks beside them. Etc etc. I know it's all part of the mythos they've built but there it is.
Now, I am well aware this may be entirely personal and a shit ton of projection because of my relationship with my kid but I can't decide if this is just new to me and it's a 'welcome to true fandom, where the hell have you been?!' or a novel situation worthy of thinking about some more. Your post emboldened the latter reading but I may well be talking complete bollocks so forgive me if so.
― (picnic, lightning) very very frightening (Chinaski), Wednesday, 30 August 2023 09:43 (one year ago) link
tl;dr - a daft old man is worried about the boys.
― (picnic, lightning) very very frightening (Chinaski), Wednesday, 30 August 2023 09:48 (one year ago) link
It was extraordinary but also contributed to an ongoing feeling that this simply isn't sustainable; that they're playing that is so combustible it's bound to explode at some point. Julien is too damaged. Phoebe is just a chaos engine. Lucy will tire of being the third who walks beside them. Etc etc. I know it's all part of the mythos they've built but there it is.
wow, amazing
― the dreaded dependent claus (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 30 August 2023 10:03 (one year ago) link
in the hospital, nearly met my grandma again lol
lol
― maf you one two (maffew12), Wednesday, 30 August 2023 11:35 (one year ago) link
great post Tim F
― corrs unplugged, Thursday, 31 August 2023 07:01 (one year ago) link
They killed on SNL tonight.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Sunday, 12 November 2023 06:00 (nine months ago) link
Here's "Satanist"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hniH8I8c-m0
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Sunday, 12 November 2023 15:13 (nine months ago) link
No one has ever done less holding a BC Rich
― Paul Ponzi, Sunday, 12 November 2023 15:31 (nine months ago) link
I enjoyed both songs. Old man me was also won over to them in part awhile back hearing Bridgers talk about music and her family and such on her Sirius XM radio show.
― curmudgeon, Sunday, 12 November 2023 17:33 (nine months ago) link
I just watched SNL and I really wanted David Letterman to walk out after they performed so I could get a handle on the relative heights of the band
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 23 November 2023 00:38 (nine months ago) link
wait I thought he was in the band..?
― stuffing your suit pockets with cold, stale chicken tende (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 23 November 2023 01:18 (nine months ago) link
Big ol’ Variety interviewhttps://variety.com/2023/music/news/boygenius-hitmakers-group-of-the-year-interview-1235813944/
― Ned Raggett, Thursday, 30 November 2023 18:58 (nine months ago) link
Just gorgeous
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01NExGVZHbc
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Monday, 25 December 2023 01:57 (eight months ago) link
https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/boygenius-going-on-hiatus-1235596363/
― StanM, Friday, 2 February 2024 21:16 (seven months ago) link
Only reaching #31 on the ILM end of year albums poll must have been too much for them.
― Dan Worsley, Friday, 2 February 2024 21:39 (seven months ago) link
Not strong enough to be a band
― jaymc, Friday, 2 February 2024 21:42 (seven months ago) link
I felt like that was kinda built into their thing. They were always going to go back to solo careers and/or other collaborations.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 3 February 2024 01:58 (seven months ago) link
(which the article also says, if I'd actually read to the end)
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Saturday, 3 February 2024 01:59 (seven months ago) link
Every band is on hiatus when they are not touring or recording.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 3 February 2024 02:09 (seven months ago) link
Yeah, in all honesty they probably didn't need to make an announcement. I pretty much figured once the tour was over, their next projects would be their own individual albums.
― birdistheword, Saturday, 3 February 2024 17:57 (seven months ago) link
(Actually I should reel that back in - saying that at a private show is not exactly an announcement to the press.)
― birdistheword, Saturday, 3 February 2024 17:58 (seven months ago) link
really like their new Gretsch signature guitar, based on the Broadcaster but without a Bigsby and has a trapeze bridge instead
https://gretschguitars.com/boygenius
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Monday, 5 February 2024 15:34 (seven months ago) link
My favorite of their three lovable Grammy speeches last night. (This was the third one, so they'd already got most of the thank-yous out of the way.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-YIAw1Arrk
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Monday, 5 February 2024 15:55 (seven months ago) link
did they play "Layla" every time someone went to the stage?!
― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Monday, 5 February 2024 15:58 (seven months ago) link
or just boygenius!?
― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Monday, 5 February 2024 15:59 (seven months ago) link
I think the cues were pegged to the categories (so, "Rock Song" gets "Layla") — but I didn't pay enough attention to say for sure.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Monday, 5 February 2024 16:33 (seven months ago) link