Phoebe, Lucy, and Julien make me feel seen.
Let's see how this goes...
Hey guys,
This time I’m trying something new.
I have an idea.
I’m getting it out of my brain.
And sharing it with you.
I just wrote this in roughly 30 minutes.
I’m not looking it over for grammar or syntax or anything else.
I’m letting the words manifest and putting them out in the world.
And seeing what comes back to me.
Thanks for taking the time
I just spent the last two or so hours walking around Denver, a city where I don’t live, with one great beer session with strangers in between listening to “$20” by boygenius, the superest of super groups consisting of Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus, and Julien Baker.
(Part of me wants to go back and hyperlink their names, but that would break up the flow ya dig?)
As a superfan of music, I get into the occasional mood where I stream the same song like 50-60 times in a row. Not exaggerating. Other examples are “midnight sun” by Nilufer Yanya and “Streetlight Blues” by Squirrel Flower, and “Down” by St. Vincent (did anyone else see her cover “Glory Box” on Fallon. Holy fucking shit).
And to be honest, I never read too much into it. All four of the aforementioned songs are so unrealistically fantastic. There’s no need to justify why you may want to hear them constantly until your dying breath.
But this time was different.
And I know why.
For the longest time (a.k.a. my whole life) I never gave a shit about the meaning behind lyrics (ironic considering I’m a writer) because it’s all interpretative.
Say what you want in a song. Everyone is going to interpret it how they want. So why focus on the meaning?
Like Rick Rubin swaying in his studio in his recent 60 Minutes special, it’s about the feeling. Half the time I don’t even know what the artist is even saying. I see no need to go into genius.com and analyze.
Music gave (and gives) me a release from my Capricorn-ass brain from analyzing everything to the point that I can’t sleep.
It’s one of the millions of reason why I’ve dedicated my life to it.
Something changed recently, though.
And that change actually came in response to one of the aforementioned artists: Squirrel Flower, real name Ella Williams.
I was blessed to see her perform without a band a couple weeks ago at Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco as a part of the 30th anniversary of Noise Pop.
To preface, normally, like I suggested earlier, my mind is a constant, incessant brigade of thoughts. Rarely quiet. Never silent.
The name of this newsletter is Writer’s Brain, and so you know that I appreciate the stream, but sometimes…
Some fucking times…
It’s just too much.
Like chill the fuck out.
I can’t deal with this right now.
And the last place I want to deal with it is at the gig.
Especially if that gig is resplendent in its quietude. Like, for instance, a gig where Ella is playing without a band.
Yes her voice is voluminous to where it could fill the same venues where Jean-Michel Jarre played for 3 million people, but still.
That doesn’t mean I want the little bastard in my head telling me about all the times in my life when I fucked up. It’s been decades of that at this point.
Yet it was Ella who made me realize during her solo set that I was approaching the idea from a perspective averse to my intention.
Every meditation teacher ever will tell you that you can’t turn off your thoughts (which is why this next part is actually kind of embarrassing because I’ve been meditating since I was 16) and the point is not to turn them off or to push them away.
The point is to see them for what they are, love them for what they are, and let them go.
And I discovered, eyes closed, hugging myself (but actually hugging my suicidal inner child) that’s actually why I fucking love music the way I do is because, within it, I find a safe space.
All the things that are happening in there are actually no one’s business. The things that I’ve shared with some people who have shown the most beautiful support. The things I’ve shared with others who have axed me out of their lives for doing so.
I feel OK with them when I’m listening to music.
I definitely wasn’t looking for any kind of reason before this. I didn’t need one.
But finding one.
I can’t describe that feeling.
And I’m not going to try.
I do know, however, the exact moment at which I made the discovery.
There was a point when Ella sang:
“I’m not scared of the water. The rain is my parent and I am the daughter.”
I’ve never told this to anyone besides my therapist.
My mother died in July 2021. She died in the house where I live. After over a week of lingering, I had no idea what to do. I didn’t know how long it was going to last, so I figured I should try to do some work.
I’m in my room on the computer writing.
She’s in the other room expelling the last few breaths.
It starts raining.
Despite any storms in LA this winter that have caused the same amount of damage as a 6.0 earthquake, rain in July is not a thing.
From June to October it’s hot as shit.
But this July 26, 2021, it was raining.
My Dad, who is by my mom’s bedside, texts me.
“Mom has passed away.”
She’s dead.
And one second later.
The rain stops.
My mom became rain. It’s not up for debate. That’s what happened.
That’s why when Ella sang those lyrics I discovered the truest thing about myself I ever have before. The reason I love music the way I do.
Which is essentially the reason I am who I am today.
And what further intrigues me about the experience with Ella is that it was based on lyrics.
As I stated earlier, I never put much weight on lyrics.
I didn’t write them. Why should I care about what they mean?
The music already affects me the way it does. I don’t need to add definitions. That just cages what the music can be.
But those words.
“I’m not scared of the water. The rain is my parent and I am the daughter.”
Those are literal words to me.
There is no ambiguity.
They have a specific meaning. Even if Ella didn’t realize it at the time.
She wrote that song for me.
And this night…
In Denver…
A city where I don’t live…
I think I found another song that was written for me.
That song is “$20” by boygenius. The superest of super groups consisting of Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus, and Julien Baker.
To preface (is there a term for a midway-through preface? Maybe I’ll invent it) The past couple of weeks for me have been fucking horrendous.
Not too long ago I got slapped in the fucking face by patterns that I thought I had broken, and people I truly care about told me to fuck off in the most hurtful way.
(Yeah I know I set a precedent in this essay for being revelatory, but delving into my patterns stemming from childhood trauma is not beneficial for me to divulge nor you to consume)
And you know how people post those different-looking almost-memes with the quote that essentially says:
“When you’re happy you enjoy the music.
When you’re sad you understand the lyrics.”??
Well considering that I now have a specific example of lyrics changing my fucking life, I figured maybe I should lean into that quote in my misery.
I’ve been gravitating toward boygenius for two main reasons.
The first is simple.
I’m currently in the process of curating an interview with them. If there’s any wood in your immediate vicinity please give it a knock in the hope that this interview works out.
The second is a little less simple.
For a while, I’ve been wondering why I’ve been loving the indie sound so much the past couple of years.
Yes, I know everyone goes through listening phases, but for a genre to speak to me the way Phoebe solo and Ella and Gracie Abrams and all these artists who sell their instrumental virtuosity at a pawn shop so they can afford to buy jackets with their heart already sewn on the sleeve do…
I only figured out why again after Ella. Because these are the artists that I feel truly offer a safe space for me to explore the real reasons I am who I am.
And so again in my miserable state, I thought let’s (saying the plural “let’s” because I’m referring to myself and the numerous voices in my head) not only lean into the sound but perhaps analyze some lyrics of these artists once again.
“$20” is my most traumatic years.
Do you remember those teens-to-early-20s-years (and perhaps the many years after) when you disregarded any and all productivity, logic, reason, common sense, and safety in order to feel less lonely?
(To be honest, I hope you don’t have those years. I hope you were emotionally healthy and didn’t do stupid shit like I’m about to describe).
“It’s a bad idea, and I’m all about it,” Julien sings to open the song.
When I found myself hungover on UV Blue in an empty house dozens of miles from home with people I didn’t like, actually people I fucking despised, because even being in this state was preferable to experiencing my own thoughts?
And all it took to keep it going was $20?
$20 buys more alcohol.
$20 is enough to buy more weed.
$20 is enough to make it all go away for a few more minutes while I assault myself for wanting to make it go away when I’m in the top .000001% of the most privileged people on planet fucking Earth.
“In another life we were arsonists,” the trio sings together with equal harmonies to The Beatles.
Because I was sitting there burning down anything. My health, my value, my sanity (in a figurative fashion of course)
But in another life, I’d actually burn down that house just for the kicks.
And it’s not just the lyrics either.
If you listen to the song, it alternates between time signatures in a way so few artists before them have been able to implement.
Transitioning between 7/4, 5/4, 6/8, oh wait, they throw in a bar of eight just cause.
It’s not something that’s immediately apparent (mostly because their skill as arrangers is just fucking immaculate). What is apparent is the song doesn’t have the same straightforward feel as the millions of songs written in 4/4.
It extends, condenses, changes lanes, swerves over double yellows because the person driving to Reno so they can play with fire in that T-bird graveyard is actually drunk as fuck.
(I’ve driven drunk and gotten in cars with drunk drivers way too many times during those $20 years.)
The song’s a fucking mess. But it somehow comes together.
I’ve never felt so seen. Especially because by the end they’re screaming.
And I don’t think it would be possible for me to feel that seen when I was in the moment of those $20-fueled horrendous decisions.
Because a part of negating my thoughts to the point that they’re gasping for air under the inundation of substances and distractions is that I didn’t notice them at all.
I could only feel seen in hindsight.
Because that hindsight version of me.
That’s the version that led to me getting slapped in the fucking face by the people I cared about.
That’s the version that still dictates so much of my actions.
But that’s the difference between that version and me (other than I’m not spending $20 to buy tepid products of empty distractions).
I can see myself for who I was.
I can see how that version of myself became the man I am today.
I can see how to move forward.
And now that I have lyrics as a true ally, doubling down on the allyship from music itself…
…Let’s say I actually feel OK.
I certainly could never share this with an audience in those years. Not even if you paid me $20.