Phoebe Bridgers’ platinum blonde wisps of hair give her a halo. Whether she’s like an angel or an alien (maybe both), her presence and her voice are undeniably ethereal. Our current state of the world feels like the warped reality Bridgers tells so well in her music. If you’re currently stuck in the strange limbo of staying at home from COVID-19, her indie folk discography is the perfect compliment to the confinement you may be experiencing. Let’s unpack what makes Phoebe Bridgers the hauntingly beautiful artist she is, and then explore the collaborative playlist making that’s kept me sane through these past week and a half.
From picking her guitar for intimate audiences to collaborating with Fiona Apple and appearing in Rolling Stones’ “Songs You Need to Know” segment, Bridgers’ rise to success has been strong and steady. On February 26th of this strange year, Bridgers released “Garden Song,” her first solo piece since her 2017 debut album, Stranger in the Alps. In 2017, John Mayer tweeted about Stranger, “This is the arrival of a giant.” “Garden Song,” and hopefully her second album, promises the same. It showcases yet again her strength in her ability to translate her eccentric inner thoughts into songwriting. Lyrics that flow from:
Someday, I’m gonna live in your house up on the hill
And when your skinhead neighbor goes missing
I’ll plant a garden in the yard
And they’re glueing roses on a flatbed
You should see it, I mean thousands
I grew up here til it all went up in flames
Except the notches in the doorframe.
These lyrics are straightforward as far as her writing goes. Bridgers grew up in Pasadena, CA, which was severely affected by the California wildfires of this past year. The surprising combination of roses and a flatbed truck, as well as the voyeuristic perspective, reminds me of the wonders one can observe even from the confines of a small neighborhood. Bridgers dances between reality and dreams in a way that can’t help but string up our imaginations. I think this song is a stay-inside-for-weeks remedy because it takes our idea of home, and a picture of suburban life, and warps it in a grimy funhouse mirror. Her sweet soprano voice singing darkly poetic lines instills her place as a nymphlike creature dressed in all black. Each line offers something so familiar and intriguingly new at the same time, just like Bridgers herself. She’s incredibly tangible and simultaneously untouchable. Bridgers brings us to her memories and experiences for her own creative journey, but they become something of their own, as all art does. More fodder for our recluse imaginations comes in the form of her music video for “Garden Song.” She writes on Instagram, “I don’t smoke weed because I’m already afraid of everything but I told my brother to get me stoned in his bedroom and scare me for this video. Everyone let me do this for some reason. Garden Song music video out now.” She sits in a bedroom, smoking a bong and waiting while colored lights and surprise nightmarish characters come in and out of the frame while she sings the lyrics. Its fever dream quality is probably relatable to a lot of us right about now.
The premature end of my sophomore year in the face of this global pandemic has brought a couple of hidden gifts. For one, living at home for the first time since I went to boarding school at 15 is luckily really nice. Getting sick at home feels relatively better than if I were languishing in my mouldy dorm room. Being evicted from campus and physically distanced from my friends has also brought creative ways of staying in touch. So far, my favorite method of keeping the people I admire close to me is through a collaborative playlist on Spotify. Do you have three or four people who always send you amazing music? Do you then share music sent by one of these people with the others, even if they don’t know each other and basically take credit for “finding” the song? Well, I put my four people, most of whom don’t talk to each other regularly, in a group chat, stated its purpose as a place to share songs and talk about music, and an awesome collective was born. The original acquaintances added more, and now we have a bustling virtual jam session that has turned into an even better playlist. One member aptly named the group “You’ve Probably Never Heard of Them,” in light of our shared love of discovering semi-niche indie artists that most people we know have probably never heard of them. It’s a self deprecating name because we’re each individually aware that we’re the music snobs of our respective friend groups, and we love it. As one of the group members said yesterday, “I love when I go to add a song to the playlist and it alerts that it’s already been added.” The playlist is now 14 hours and 9 minutes long, and full of songs I love on the first listen peppered with songs I already know and adore.
If you’re feeling bored and lonely, which I think we all do, collect a bunch of people who love the music you do and find limitless auditory entertainment for the upcoming weeks. Apple Music has this collaborative feature too, and while Soundcloud does not, there are definitely ways to get around it like creating a music related group chat and having someone compile a master playlist of suggestions. Take a break from online classes or binge-watching Netflix, plug in your earphones, and drown out your family members while discovering new music with friends.
Anthem 