American singer-songwriter Phoebe Bridgers opens up her album “Lost Weekend” into sheer delight on “Bobby,” track five, a song constructed around a new love after years of harsher subject matter.
Bridgers begins the track with a shriek, which is shocking from an artist who prefers restraint to abrupt bursts of emotion. That first jolt is a clue that things have really changed. Instead of easing into the theme of the song, she drives the listener headlong into an emotional register she rarely allows herself to fully occupy on record.
Bobby is a big turning point over “Lost Weekend.” Bridgers first drops his name on “Kill Me” almost as a throwaway lyric, then comes back to him here straight before coming back again on “Liberty Tree.” “Bobby,” she says again, “this could be the end of wanting.” She makes him not another turn in the cycle of pain but something nearer to an end. Critics have pointed out that the album often plays like a story of two individuals, one alive and one dead, with Bobby as the counterpoint to the anguish running through tunes like “The Outside” and “Still Standing.”
And that bright tone extends through the production, as well. Much of “Lost Weekend” is about processing loss and disorientation, while “Bobby” feels genuinely light, allowing Bridgers to sound cheerful without sarcasm or self-protection getting in the way.
“Bobby” feels like the point where Bridgers lets herself feel wonderful after years of dissociation and unresolved sadness across this album — does this track affect the way you hear the rest of the record?
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