The whole is greater than the sum of its parts: the record
by: Cailyn Schiltz
Boygenius is more than a band: it’s a supergroup. Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus are all incredible artists on their own, and they come together as Boygenius to create a masterpiece: the record. Boygenius’ first full-length album is an ode to friendship and platonic love, and the ecstasy and agony of being seen and known.
Photo: Harrison Whitford
The love between Baker, Bridgers, and Dacus seems to span decades and generations. Boygenius looks to the past with the opening track, “Without You Without Them.” This song is completely a cappella, highlighting the lyrics and harmonies. In perfect unison, they sing about how grateful they are to have one another in their lives, and extend that thanks to the families and ancestors that came before. It sounds like an all-woman barbershop quartet, and introduces the concepts of time and gendered power dynamics as characters in this album, as fully realized as any member of the band.
It feels like the very best parts of each artist’s lyricism and musical style get a chance to shine: Julien Baker gets to explore both her acoustic roots and the edgier rock style she developed in Little Oblivions, Phoebe Bridgers gives her signature quiet rage, and Lucy Dacus’s lyricism and storytelling prowess elevates the standout tracks.
“Anti-Curse” feels the most in line with Julien Baker’s style. “Anti-Curse” explores the overwhelming nature of surviving with religious trauma with a real story as a metaphor; Baker almost drowned during high tide while the band was together, writing this album. The water and the pain came up all too quickly, and Baker is “makin’ peace with [her] inevitable death,” and takes stock of her accomplishments, like “[trying] to be a halfway decent friend.” When she washes up on the beach, she espouses this song as “an incantation like an anti-curse, or even a blessing.” Baker grapples with the irony of describing a painful event as a blessing, and settles halfway with the phrase “anti-curse.” It acknowledges and challenges the bad while also refuting it.
“$20” kicks off with an anthemic bassline and drums that drive a message of exhaustion desperation. A passion-project car is abandoned on cinder blocks and Bridgers wails in the background for a negligible amount of money, just $20. This song blends the intensity of Bridgers’ “I Know The End” with the dread from Baker’s “Heatwave.”
“Emily I’m Sorry” and “Revolution 0” are quintessential Phoebe Bridgers songs. Isolated from the rest of the record and compared to Bridgers’ standalone work, they’re fantastic songs. They’re melancholy and introspective, and use simple language and short phrases to paint a painfully relatable portrait of a depressed 20-something trying to piece her life together. Dacus and Bridgers sing floaty harmonies, but these songs fall flat compared to the rest of the album. Bridgers comes back to life on the closing track, “Letter To An Old Poet.” It starts like many Phoebe Bridgers’ songs: with a quiet piano intro and a white-noise quality. But this one has a tension to it, and she directly addresses the complaints I have with her other songs on the record. She sings “you said my music is mellow, maybe I’m just exhausted,” and I reconsider my thoughts on “Emily I’m Sorry” and “Revolution 0.” Why should music about tension and heartache cater to a desire for flair and entertainment when in reality, those conflicts play out slowly and quietly? I digress.
What makes “Letter To An Old Poet” such a standout track and the clear fan favorite is the fact that it’s a reimagining of Boygenius’s biggest hit, “Me & My Dog” from their self-titled EP released in 2018. The melodies mirror one another, and the lyrical parallels in the last verse shows such growth. “Me & My Dog” climaxes with “I wanna be emaciated. I wanna hear one song without thinking of you. I wish I was on a spaceship, just me and my dog and an impossible view. I dream about it and I wake up falling.” The anorexic, desperate plea to leave this planet evolves into something matured, evolved, and recovering on “Letter To An Old Poet.” Boygenius sings “I wanna be happy. I’m ready to walk into my room without looking for you. I’ll go up to the top of our building and remember my dog when I see the full moon. I can’t feel it yet, but I am waiting.” All three members of Boygenius create such beautiful music and meaningful art from their own pain, but the record is a testament to equal beauty that exists in growth, happiness, and friendship.
Photo: Matt Grubb
The most beautiful lines on this album come from Lucy Dacus’s mouth. She’s got a voice like black pepper: it’s dark, it’s subtle, it’s got an edge, and it’s a staple on the record. Dacus takes the vocal lead on the songs that bring home the message of friendship on this album: “True Blue,” “Leonard Cohen” and “We’re In Love.” The third track on the album, “True Blue” describes the kind of love that underscores every lyric, every note, and every heavenly 3-part harmony on this album: “your love is tough, your love is tried and true blue.” The bond between these three women has been tested by mental illness, addiction, and the unsteady nature and misogyny of the music industry, but they use those experiences to understand each other better, forgive without keeping score, and come back stronger as a unit.
“Leonard Cohen” tells a true story, much like “Anti-Curse.” On a road trip, Phoebe Bridgers once added an hour to the drive because she was so invested in the song she was playing. Baker and Dacus recognized how important it was to her, and practiced radical acceptance in the backseat. Extra time in the car meant more time to hang out, it was about the journey rather than the destination. The story makes this song special, but Dacus’s closing line of “I never thought you’d happen to me” drives the message home. Describing friendship as something that happens to someone highlights the role of chance in our everyday lives. Meeting the people that complete us is a product of lucky happenstance, and that deserves such gratitude.
“We’re In Love” is a little on-the-nose for the theme of the album, but nonetheless it is a gorgeous song. My favorite element is how the concept of time and past lives comes into play and behaves as a misplaced bookend for “Without You Without Them.” “Without You Without Them” looks to the past to love each other’s history, and “We’re In Love” looks forward to love future versions of each other. Dacus promises to find Baker and Bridgers in the next life with references to what brought them together in this life: hummingbirds, baby scorpions, and a deep knowledge of each other.
The best songs on the album are the most collaborative, “Cool About It,” “Satanist,” and “Not Strong Enough.” The structure is simple, and it works so well. Each member of Boygenius gets one verse to tell their side of the story, and they come together for a chorus. “Cool About It” describes an awkward meetup after some kind of falling out: expectations are mismatched, nobody is taking responsibility or saying what they mean, and the conversation doesn’t sink past shallow questions and life updates. It feels like getting burned when you pull a dish out of the oven early: someone gets hurt, and there’s not even a satisfying conclusion yet. It needs a little more time and space to finish cooking. But, it takes a level of commitment to put it back in the oven, and it’s hard to give that when you’re still nursing an injury.
“Satanist” pulls the three artists together with three distinct ideologies: Satanism, anarchy, and nihilism. They take the moody, angsty connotations away from these ideals and flip them. Baker’s Satanism becomes the “selling out” deemed necessary to make music professionally. Bridgers’ anarchy is all a front and a performance, even an anti-capitalist has to participate in the system to survive. Dacus’s nihilism takes on a cheerfulness; “if nothing matters, man, that’s a relief.” “Satanist” is about three people doing their best and trying to create meaning and keep their head above water in a business that preys on people’s pain.
“Not Strong Enough” is my favorite song on the record. It feels more commercially pop than the rest of the album, but it’s still true to the core message of the album. Each verse juxtaposes happy moments with darker ones, and unites on the line “I don’t know why I am the way I am” with varying degrees of self loathing or acceptance. It all comes to a head with the line “always an angel, never a god;” it’s escalated, harmonized on, and repeated twelve times before Dacus takes us home with a belty conclusion: a vignette of choosing home over aimless wandering. The “always an angel, never a god” line resonates as a description of how women are treated and seen in the music industry. Angels are perfect and inspirational, whereas a god is allowed to create with agency. By going home in the end, Boygenius is refusing to buy into angelhood. Wallowing in pain to create more sad records isn’t healthy for anyone, and sometimes it’s better to accept the way that you are instead of wondering why until you spin out.
Good friends bring out the best in each other, and this album is auditory proof of that. Boygenius’ styles and sounds enmesh on the record to create a whole that’s greater than the sum of its parts.