Album Review: Phoebe Bridgers - Lost Weekend

I don’t do album reviews anywhere near as much as I once did but I felt like I absolutely HAD to review this one.

Phoebe Bridgers, one third of the indie rock supergroup Boygenius dropped her third solo album today and goddamn if it isn’t perfection. It is absolutely exquisite. Lost Weekend is pure fucking gold and the type of record that makes you want to listen again and again and again.

Lyrically speaking, there is a deliberate emotional arc that becomes apparent with each listen. The album legitimately made me cry the first couple of times that I listened to it. There is something to her music that is difficult to explain. The songs are quiet but not necessarily gentle. There is an incredible amount of emotional weight underneath the surface and the more closely you pay attention, the more you realize just how much is happening here.

Phoebe’s vocal delivery makes the emotional punch of these songs land so much harder. Her voice is truly hypnotic and has one of those voices that doesn’t demand your attention so much as quietly just takes it. There is a vulnerability I the way that she delivers these songs that makes even the quiet moments feel enormous.

The intimacy of these songs, dealing with themes of grief, complication relationships, loneliness, regret, emotional ambiguity, and all of the complicated bullshit that comes with being human is what makes this record nail it on every level. She has a way of taking something deeply personal and deliver it in a way that feels like she is just sitting down having a conversation with you. And somewhere along the way, you realize that you are completely and utterly emotionally fucked.

While the album doesn’t rely on bombastic production (although the production itself is pretty magnificently done) to make its point, the arrangements never have to scream at you for the message to come through. There is a restraint to the way these songs are constructed that make the moments when everything opens up and is so powerful that it kicks you in the nuts.

This album is absolutely a MUST LISTEN!

Album highlights: “Lost Boys,” “The Governor’s Waltz,” “The Outside,” “As Above,” “Haunted,” “Still Standing,” “I Can’t Wait,” and “Never Going Back.”