boygenius performing on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert earlier this month. Photo / Getty Images
boygenius performing on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert earlier this month. Photo / Getty Images
The American indie super trio of Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus brought a variety of pace and sentiment to their March debut album, the record, but their follow-up EP, the rest, is a quieter take. Serving as a deluxe edition dedicated to their impressive story-telling skills, the foursongs follow complex, often melancholic, relationships with others or, in some cases, themselves. As one member takes the lead of a certain song, the others support the individual’s proclamations as loyal friends do, sometimes with ethereal hums and harmonies. Black Hole’s beginning sees Baker describing a moment of a cigarette on the porch at night, before the group lists the details of a person they don’t want to miss, “White teeth, black light, white tee, brown eyes / Bad boy, big fight, you’re a good guy.”
Dacus’s Afraid of Heights is a well-woven tale of one reckless and one cautious person debating which lifestyle is more worthwhile.
Bridgers’ lullaby-like Voyager is her after thoughts following similarly reckless encounters: “There are nights you say you don’t remember / When you stepped on the gas and you asked if I’m ready to die.”
boygenius restrain the production to let the lyrics carry the day but Baker’s lead on Powers is a satisfyingly punchy finale as the EP drifts off into a harmony of trumpets. If the last two records and lyrical prowess from “the boys” were not enough to bring on an existential crisis, the rest surely will.
