Spending A Lost Weekend with Phoebe Fucking Bridgers
Phoebe Bridgers has returned with her third studio album, Lost Weekend, a collection of treasures to be found, secrets to be unlocked, and mysteries to be discovered. Grab your tissues. Let's get sad.
Lost Weekend by Phoebe Bridgers
Lost Weekend ends a six-year drought since Phoebe's last solo record, 2020's Grammy-nominated Punisher. Of course, she wasn't exactly sitting around during that time; she was busy with her indie supergroup boygenius, alongside fellow queer indie-rock luminaries Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus, a project that walked away with three Grammys, including Best Rock Song.
Bridgers has always been a celebrated songwriter despite having, until now, only two solo records to her name. Those two records, 2017's Stranger in the Alps and 2020's Punisher, contain some of the most well-crafted indie earworms of the last decade. She's collaborated with everyone from Conor Oberst to the aforementioned Baker and Dacus to Manchester Orchestra and just about everyone else in the indie-rock family tree. Her deep immersion in that world, coupled with raw talent, has brought her acclaim from nearly every music publication, a shelf of Grammy nominations, and a growing army of fans who've been touched by her songs in deep, meaningful ways.
As a 50ish, white, straight, cis, hetero, male, Gen X dad, I am decidedly not in Ms. Bridgers' target demographic. But as a fan of good music, I've fallen under the siren spell of her unique talent. Phoebe Bridgers is my favorite female artist and one of my favorite songwriters, period. Insert "how do you do, fellow sad girls?" meme here.
On Lost Weekend, Bridgers' talent, experience, and gift for collaboration converge into something that feels less like an album and more like a brilliant, almost cinematic experience. It’s an artistic snapshot of a moment in time that manages to be both classic and timeless. It's the rare record that begs to be listened to in full, in order, start to finish, and then immediately compels you to hit play again.
Loss, Grief, and the Sad Girl
One theme runs through the entire record: loss, grief, and how we experience, process, and eventually deal with it. Many listeners are connecting the dots that Lost Weekend serves, in part, as Phoebe's reckoning with her father's death. Bridgers announced her father's passing on Instagram on January 3, 2023, sharing an old photo of the two of them with the caption "Rest in peace dad." She never shared a cause of death. Her father, Tony Bridgers, worked as a film and television set builder, and the two had a famously complicated relationship, one she's written about before, most memorably on "Kyoto."
On Lost Weekend, Bridgers confronts that loss head-on right out of the gate on "The Outside," a track that walks through the disorienting experience of attending her father's funeral. A distorted, robotic, effect-laden voice declares, "Crying in a suit and tie / but you should see the other guy" a line that captures, with unsettling precision, the dissociated, disconnected feeling of standing at a parent's funeral while some other part of your brain narrates the whole thing like a bystander. I've seen more than one person online already crown Lost Weekend the unofficial soundtrack to the Dead Dad's Club.
Bridgers wastes no time pulling you back out of the depths with the upbeat, almost poppy lead single "Lost Boys", a possible indie-rock retelling of Peter Pan's lost boys, or maybe just a song about the men who never quite grow up. Either way, it harkens back to other catchy Bridgers hits like "Kyoto" or "Motion Sickness," complete with a signature post-bridge count-in — "One, two, three, WOO!" that plays like a trailer for her upcoming arena tour. I can already picture 20,000-plus sad girls (and a handful of Gen X dads) screaming it back at her.
Bridgers has carefully sequenced this record so the songs seamlessly flow into each other while still covering a wide range of styles and sonics, each one designed to hit a specific emotion. "Kill Me," with its whisper-quiet vocals, dissolves into the almost sing-songy, but equally hushed "The Governor's Waltz."
This album is so good that even Olivia Rodrigo is looking forward to being sad along with the rest of us!
The Country Curveball
My favorite surprise on the record comes on "Bobby" and "Haunted," where Bridgers delivers a pair of indie-rock anthems soundly rooted in country music. Both tracks delicately echo the best of Taylor Swift's country/pop/indie crossover work; think of them as a companion piece, a sequel, or maybe an indie-film remake of the folklore trilogy: "Cardigan," "August," and "Betty." On "Haunted," Bridgers, who typically so effectively tears listeners' hearts to shreds, proudly declares, "I'm gonna put myself together / You can go, or you can stay / I'm going to put myself together either way," delivered with an unexpected and gorgeous country twang. It's the line that gives both Bridgers and her listeners, by proxy, permission to heal. She's basically saying: it's okay to be sad, but it's also important to grow through it.
Love, Loss, and Everything In Between
Lost Weekend isn't only about grief, it's also about love, hope, and breakups, with Bridgers mining her recent and past romantic relationships for material. Most of the songs are co-written with longtime collaborator Christian Lee Hutson, with additional contributions from current partner Bo Burnham, among others.
At 16 songs, Lost Weekend is by far Bridgers' longest album, but she pulls it off in a tight 53 minutes, enough time to run you through nearly every emotion on the human spectrum before the record reaches its absolutely devastating conclusion. "As Above" and "Lost Weekend (Reprise)" deliver on the promise of the whole album, soaring vocals layered over quiet piano and dreamy production courtesy of Bridgers herself alongside Ethan Gruska, Jack Antonoff, Tony Berg, and Alex G. She closes the record on a note of hard-won hope, singing, "But we're gonna be alright / Me and you / You love me, and I won't ever let you forget / Not yet…"
Wrap Up
Lost Weekend is nothing less than a masterpiece. Phoebe Bridgers is at the top of her game and the absolute peak of her powers here. Her vocals are incredible, ranging from signature whisper-quiet refrains to full-throated screams, and every inch of that range is on devastating display. The sonics are immaculate, best experienced on vinyl or through headphones so you don't miss a single ounce of the nuance and craftsmanship baked into every track. Her handpicked producers and collaborators all serve the album rather than compete with it, resulting in a sound that's simultaneously modern and timeless, resolutely indie yet accessibly poppy.
This is art. Beautifully, painstakingly crafted by a singular talent working at the height of her powers. Grab your tissues, your headphones, and your journal, and get ready to get lost with Phoebe Bridgers.
Phoebe Bridgers: Lost Weekend 5 Bars: This is The Single Greatest Thing I’ve Ever Experienced.
