Coming off weirder and wiser than the bounty of brooding female singer-songwriters that emerged alongside her the past decade, Phoebe Bridgers has earned her place in the pop music universe, even as she’s made choices to actively transcend it. The L.A.-based artist’s authenticity has always burned bright, even when she went dark—which she often does—thematically. From her stirring debut, 2017’s Stranger in the Alps, to her Grammy-winning breakthrough, 2020’s Punisher, her output feels like an organic reflection of who she is as a person—playful, defiant, and droll. She’s still all of these things, but she’s also still growing.

Her long awaited third album, Lost Weekend, is classic Phoebe in a lot of ways, from its quotably subversive lyrical moments (referencing everything from The Shining to Elliott Smith) to its ethereal delivery. Lush layers of melody and instrumentation submerges the listener in both metaphoric thought and shifting moods.

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It’s been six years since her last release unintentionally captured the isolation of the pandemic and remnants of #MeToo (she was part of a landmark New York Times story about her boyfriend Ryan Adams’s abusive behavior, the year before her career-defining album came out). At the time, she told the LA Times that her music was about “having a personal life while the world is blowing up.” 

Well, the world is still blowing up, and Lost Weekend makes for an evocative and relevant soundtrack, trippy and tempestuous, as it highlights both the pain of loss (and death) and the healing power of love. Bridgers is 31 now and her indie folk flair retains the wonder that made her stand out, but it’s also evolved as she’s matured mentally and let herself explore.

Opening with the cosmic launch of the vocoder-driven cut called “The Outside,” it quickly becomes clear that the planetarium “experiences” and laser shows she’s utilized as listening events recently were more than a novel marketing idea. This is a constellation of songs that will be best enjoyed in harmonic headphone sessions. She opted to elevate this idea for fans with a show designed by Laser Fantasy, filled with “dazzling animations, kaleidoscopic imagery and aerial beams of light,” according to the press release. The Planetarium Experience created by National Geographic photographer Babak Tafreshi sounds no less immersive in scope, described as “an audiovisual journey filmed in nearly 20 countries with no computer-generated imagery.”

Bo Burnham, who is credited as a co-writer on several cuts, might be her lover and muse here, but the comedic crooner and prolific writer is not the only man in her head or heart. Her father died while she was writing the record, which seems to have created a sort of yin and yang of inspiration. 

Bridgers’s complicated relationship with her father, as she covered in Punisher’s “Kyoto,” is explored more here and we get to join her on the journey towards acceptance with three shimmering tunes “Still Standing,” “Never Going Back” (which features a voicemail message from her dad), and “Lost Weekend (reprise)” ending the album with its most bittersweet bite (“He’s not coming back as a bird”) as an abrupt but affective exercise in closure. 

Before we get there, we orbit into Bridgers’s personal life the past few years, from her previous relationship with Paul Mescal referenced in the opening number (“I’m supposed to be married, but I called it off”) to the actor’s new relationship with Gracie Abrams—who’s cited Bridgers as an influence—in “The Governor’s Waltz” (“And she can pretend to be me / Since she took my place in my bed on that stage / I have not lost any sleep / Being myself wasn’t easy / Do it for me”). 

Produced by Tony Berg, Ethan Gruska, Jack Antonoff, and Bridgers herself—with creative help from Alex G, Maya Hawke, Bright Eyes’ Connor Oberst, and her Boygenius mates Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus—the record disperses country twang and ambient textures with equal measure, which some might find a bit too languid as an overall package. Lost Weekend is definitely a slow-burn grower, and its brilliance comes from the various ways the music backdrops the breathy vocals, especially in the songs about Bo, or rather, “Bobby,” referenced multiple times in lyrics for “Liberty Tree,” “Kill Me,” and the buoyant, if most obvious ode called “Bobby.” 

The delicate balance between giddy love songs, aching recollections, and intricate, almost Radiohead-like soundscapes is best heard on the catchy single “Lost Boys” and the gleeful “I Can’t Wait” (“All my life, side by side / Hyde Jekyll Hyde / Finally together”), but even the cuts that aren’t as strong feel very much there for a reason. 

For all the experimentations and collaborations in her career—with Taylor Swift, SZA, Oberst, Boygenius, etc.—it’s Bridgers’s honesty and singular vision of expression that remain the most compelling things about her. The narrative laments and emotive snapshots of Lost Weekend stick with you more than any sonic flourish or new production technique that moves her forward as an artist. All together, it’s an emotional excursion worth taking.

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