boygenius is back

The all-women band cements their place in popular indie music with their second album, the record

You may recall the exponential rise in popularity of Phoebe Bridgers’ “Motion Sickness,” which hit number 26 on Billboard’s U.S. Alternative charts after its 2017 release and was certified gold in 2022 after flooding radio stations and inspiring TikTok dances.

Bridgers, an indie folk singer-songwriter, has gained nearly nine million monthly listeners on Spotify and amassed a cult following. Her extensive list of noteworthy collaborators includes Kid Cudi, SZA, Taylor Swift and Bo Burnam.

Before her newfound popularity, though, Bridgers put out an album in 2018 alongside Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker under the name boygenius. The trio recently released their highly anticipated second album and debut studio album the record after a five-year hiatus. The band has shows booked through August to promote the album, a handful of which are already sold out (including Coachella). 

The band is an amalgamation of Bridgers and her counterparts’ individual styles. Their songs are often slow and melodic, reliant on all of the singers’ full female vocals. Dacus has nearly a million and a half listeners on Spotify. Her music (like that of her band members) is often melancholy. But unlike her collaborators, Dacus isn’t afraid of booming bass lines and popp-y fast-paced tempos. Julien Baker is the most devoted to  gloominess, and unlike Bridgers and Dacus, refrains from weaving even a handful of upbeat pieces into her albums. But all three artists are consistent in their lyrical commitment to the morose.

Junior Katie England is an avid fan of Bridgers (who she saw this past summer) and boygenius (who she plans to see next weekend at Coachella). For her, the band’s expression is what sets the music apart, despite its sometimes redundant despondence. 

“They're so simple, but they're specific enough that everyone understands the feeling,” England said. “Even something to do with groceries, or something so simple and so small that wrecks your day or image or your emotional well-being. She focuses on a small collection of things that happen when you're stuck, when you're feeling anxious or depressed, these small things that you can't do at all. Her songs always make me feel so small but understood at the same time.”

However, some hear the downtrodden melodies and elaborate lyricism as indistinguishable moping. Junior Michelle Yavorskiy shared that she felt the album was too heavy-hearted to  listen to again. 

“They're all kind of the same to me,” shared Michelle. “Yesterday I was really tired and it almost lulled me to sleep. They're all just so melancholy.”

The album has 12 tracks, twice as many as the band’s debut album. Dacus, Baker and Bridgers, all experienced individuals in the music industry, bolster each others’ abilities in their collaboration. While the album is admittedly slow and sad, tracks like True Blue, $20 and Satanist offer upbeat medleys of drums, acoustic guitar and overlapping vocals that create texture in the album. 

England shared that she found the similarities between songs pleasant, as the record’s cohesion made it a “no-skip album.” Even so, the band offers a degree of newness–even the dynamic of an all-female music trio is uncommon in mainstream music. boygenius is a resistance against the male-dominated music industry.

The musicians, all queer women, offer fresh ideas, lyricism and methods in their music. Regardless of individual enjoyment of the album, fans as woebegotten as the artists find meaning in affirmation of their mental states and identities.