Phoebe Bridgers’ next release (and most recent, at least until next month’s album drop) was her first full-length album with Boygenius.

She, Lucy Dacus, and Julien Baker reunited in 2023 to release The Record, an album that built on the promise of their 2018 EP. It was a major critical success, landing seven Grammy nominations, including Album of the Year, and winning three.

I wrote about this album a few years ago, and I find my comments then still sum up my feelings about the project, and they reference today’s SOTD. So I’ll repeat them here:

“Though Bridgers is the most famous performer here, only a couple of these songs would fit neatly onto her solo albums. Instead, I can hear her style filtered through the sensibilities and sounds of her bandmates. I’m sure the same is true if you listen to this set through the lens of Dacus or Baker.

I find it fascinating how these women both honor and take the piss out of legendary male artists. Bridgers has included pointed barbs about Eric Clapton and John Lennon in her solo work. The name Boygenius is a comment on how seemingly every male songwriter is told he’s a genius from birth.

The track ‘Leonard Cohen’ knocks the titular icon as “an old man having an existential crisis at a Buddhist monastery writing horny poetry” but also quotes his beloved line “there is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” Cohen gets a writing credit on the song.

Another track, ‘Cool About It,’ doesn’t credit Paul Simon as a writer but he is mentioned in the album’s liner notes as the “inspiration” for the song. That’s because the melody in the verses bears more than a passing resemblance to Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘The Boxer.’

This battle between reverence and eye-rolling for storied male artists hits a climax in the bridge of one of the album’s best songs, ‘Not Strong Enough,’ when the trio repeats the line “Always an angel, never a God.”

The Record makes a strong case that Bridgers, Dacus, and Baker could eventually find themselves in the pantheon.”

That concludes my quick deep dive into the studio releases of Phoebe Bridgers. Next week I’ll highlight some of her non-album tracks.