Phoebe Bridgers

As she makes her return, a little story and a cover of Moon Song

I think it was 2014. I was living in Eagle Rock on the same property as one of my best friends and favorite songwriting partners - Jason Boesel. One day, with nothing to do, we found ourselves strolling the Altadena farmer’s market up at Loma Alta Park. This is way before I ever thought I’d be claiming the neighborhood as my own, let alone frequenting that same park with my wife and kids. As we were aimlessly wandering amongst produce, Jason said, “Whoa. Check that out.” He pointed up to young woman with an acoustic guitar who was busking up at the end of the row of stands - right where the market ended and the rest of the park began. She was about a hundred feet away. She was singing but I couldn’t tell what song it was. Jason’s ears must be better than mine. As I got closer I realized it was “Million Dollar Bill.” Jason hung back as I walked right up to her. I was the only person who had stopped to listen. Her hair was blonde and her voice was beautiful. I couldn’t believe how surreal it felt to hear my own song sung back to me in a setting like that.

As she finished, I got out some cash to put in the open guitar case at her feet. She could see that I had enjoyed her performance. She smiled and asked, “Have you heard of Middle Brother?” I weighed my options for a response but ended up just saying, “Yeah,” dropped the money in the case and walked away. There was no need to spoil the moment by telling her I was in that band or that I had written that song. It was perfect as it was and has remained a cherished memory.

But then another dimension got added a few years later. When Phoebe Bridgers released her first album and took the world by storm with her incredible talents, something about her felt vaguely familiar. Inevitably, in the not-as-big-as-you-think music scene here in LA, we ended up in each other’s company a handful of times. We aren’t and never were quite friends per se, but we know a lot of the same people and she’s always been nothing but lovely to me whenever we’ve interacted. Eventually two things were indirectly communicated to me: 1 - that she had listened to Dawes when she was younger and 2 - that she grew up in the Altadena/Pasadena area. Something clicked in my head and that farmer’s market moment hurled itself back into my thoughts. At some point, not that long ago, I told the whole story to one of our mutual friends and they said they were going to ask her about it. Sure enough, she busked up at that farmer’s market and had sung “Million Dollar Bill.” I had reason to believe that it was definitely Phoebe.

I hope she wouldn’t mind me sharing that story with you all. I have an immense amount of respect for what she does. Between her two solo records, Boy Genius and Better Oblivion Community Center, in my opinion, she’s cemented herself as one of the most important songwriters of the generation. And the quality and consistency of her work so far seems to portend that she’s always gonna be this good. It’s not like her work hinges on having stumbled across a catchy hook. It’s her great writing, her deep insight, and that lightning in a bottle quality of representing/sounding like a time and a place in culture. I felt similarly about the Strokes, Mumford and Sons, Bon Iver, Tame Impala in their respective moments; artists that sound like the worlds they were released into, even though they themselves are the ones who forged that sonic landscape. Phoebe Bridgers’ music is like that to me. Her brand of irony combining an end-of-days ambivalence with her rare ability for elucidating the strange beauty of the modern world - it speaks to what it’s like to be young and alive today better than just about anything. When music fans of the future look back to see what music and songwriting felt like during these years, her records will be at the top of the pile.

Ok, I’ve gone on enough. Paid subscribers - below is a cover of one of my favorites of hers.

Talk back soon.