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Phoebe Bridgers' 'Punisher' Is An Album For The Moment

Phoebe Bridgers
Frank Ockenfels
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Courtesy of the artist
Phoebe Bridgers

A few months into the pandemic, in mid-June, Phoebe Bridgers released her second full-length solo album, Punisher. Almost immediately, social media lit up with people talking about how they connected to it: from someone wanting to spend an entire appointment playing it for their therapist to another person skipping a movie with their roommate in order to take an aimless walk and listen. Punisher had quickly become an album for the moment, one that could make a person feel less alone in a time of self-isolation.

In this session, Phoebe Bridgers joins me to talk about how she has been dealing with that isolation and how making this album was not an isolated experience at all. Punisher was produced by Tony Berg and Ethan Gruska, who worked with her on her 2017 debut solo album, Stranger in the Alps; she was also joined by her Better Oblivion Community Center bandmate Conor Oberst, who helped write and sing on a few of the songs, but at it's core, Punisher is Phoebe's vision. We begin with her live performance of "Garden Song." Listen in the audio player above.

Copyright 2021 XPN. To see more, visit XPN.

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Raina Douris is the host of World Cafe.
Kimberly Junod is the senior producer of World Cafe.

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