My brain dump about this album

This is an album I know I will return to time and again. But reading the reviews here and elsewhere has made me realize that this might be a very personal sentiment.

I agree with most of the comments about how none of the tracks are earworms (except maybe “Ankles”), and how many of them are too bland to be remembered. I think the sparks in these songs are easy to miss if you're not reading the lyrics. But when you do pay a little attention to the words—oh my.

I’ve told others that I like Phoebe’s songwriting more, but I prefer Lucy as a lyricist. What I haven’t said is that I can see myself imitating her turns of phrase when jotting things down in my own journal here onwards. The stories and feelings unfolding nonstop in my mind—most of which I don’t know how to put into words—seem to be shared with her in astonishingly close resemblance. And now she’s written them down in exacting detail and sung them with incredible tenderness. Now I know I’m not alone in my joy, shame, dilemmas, melancholy, longing, cynicism, the indulgence we find in love, and the acceptance of its imperfection and impermanence. She’s given me the vocabulary to talk about these irrationalities I once thought unspeakable.

I wondered if the intensity of the resonance I feel with this album comes from the fact that I also transitioned from being attracted to men to being with a woman—and suddenly had all my presumptions about love and relationships toppled, crashed, and burned. And I wonder whether this kind of trajectory and sentiments might not be that common, and that’s why this album isn’t as popular as I thought it would be.

Not everyone has a partner with whom you “don’t touch and only talk, about what we want and cannot have,” with whom you would “throw a fit” constantly because of it. Someone you want to “let me touch you where I want to, there, there, there, there, there,” who you’d want to “pull me by the ankles to the edge of the bed, and take me like you do in your dreams”—but who instead would “help me with the crossword in the mornings … make me tea … ask me how did I sleep.”

Not everyone is in a relationship that isn’t bound by a certificate, a shared space, kids, or even the prospect of these. But you “love their body and mind,” even though “they will change, so will mine.” Where one worries, “if this doesn’t work out, I would lose my mind,” but also realizes, “and after a while, I will be fine”—even though, “I don’t wanna be fine, I want you.”

Not everyone has been seduced by the most unexpected person: “I never thought I'd see you looking at me this way, almost vulgar and out of place, like seeing the moon in the day, I find it hard not to look away,” and experienced growing certainty before making the jump: “if it's not God, it's fate; if it's not fate, it's chance; if it's my chance I'm gonna take it.” And then later gloated about being the one “to catch the most wanted man in West Tennessee,” while always wanting to “have time to write the book on you.”

Not everyone has an ex-turned-platonic-friend, who is a “big deal” who’s “got your girl, and gonna marry her, and I’ll be watching in a pinstriped suit, sincerely happy for the both of you,” and with whom “I meant every word I said, when I said it.”

Maybe not everyone is like me—radically romanticizing everything and looking for new objects of limerence despite having “a beautiful life,” just because “the stillness might eat me alive.”

But maybe more people have been in a relationship where you “run out of conversation” like “days run out of light,” while wondering: “Do I make you nervous or bored? Or did I drink you to the last drop?” ... “Why was our best sex in hotels, and our worst fights in their stairwells?”

And I do think people in long-distance relationships would appreciate the tracks “Come Out” and “Lost Time,” where there are mad and sad moments, because “I love you, and every day that I knew and didn’t say is lost time.” And being aware of the treachery of LDR—or, for that matter, any relationship—you just want to “see how far we get, so when it comes my time to lose you, I’ll have made the most of it.”

And what’s not to love about “Modigliani,” with Phoebe’s soul-striking voice singing harmony in celebration of their friendship?

Now I’m just gonna dump all my favorite lyrics without butchering them.

Ankles

What if we don't touch?

What if we only talk

About what we want and cannot have?

And I'll throw a fit

If it's all I can do

If it's the thought that counts

Let's think it through So bite me on the shoulder

Pull my hair

And let me touch you where I want to

There, there, there, there, there .... Agent of chaos, angel of death

One of three ancient fates

Playing with your scissors again

How lucky are we to have so much to lose?

Now don't move when I tell you what to do

Come Out

Why am I not wherever you are?

There is no distance that wouldn't be too far

Even on opposite sides of the room

I am orbiting you ... Waking up in a new city every day

Makes me believe more and more that they're all the same

It's just a pharmacy, coffee shop, bookstore, and bank

And a tourist attraction that most locals hate

I hike up a hill where they say there's a view

'Cause the sky around five might remind me of you

There's a couple divorcees on a bad first date

And an elderly couple with nothing to say

I used to think that'd be the worst

To grow old and run out of words

Now I have seen some incredible things

I could never describe if I tried

Limerence

I'm thinking about breaking your heart someday soon

And if I do, I'll be breaking mine too

If I stay busy, maybe I'll forget how I feel and go on living life as I planned it

So bring on the parties, I wanna go dancing

My arm 'round the waist of a friendly acquaintance

Toeing the line of betraying your trust

Why do I feel alive when I'm behaving my worst? Is there a differеnce between lying to you

If it feels just as bad as telling thе truth?

I know that there is

And I know what I'll pick

I want what we have

A beautiful life

But the stillness

The stillness might eat me alive

Best Guess

Herе is the church

Here is the steeple

You were looking for saints

But you only found people

Ain't that just the way it goes

I watched you fall from grace

You were graceful

After all, it's a small world

You may not be an angel

But you are my girl

You are my pack a day

You are my favorite place

You were my best friend before you were My best bet at the future You are my best guess If I were a gambling man, and I am You'd be my best bet

Lost Time

The sky is grey, the trees are pink

It's almost spring and I can't wait and I can't think

The sidewalk's paved with petals like a wedding aisle

I wonder how long it would take to walk eight hundred miles To say I do, I did, I will, I would

I'm not sorry, not certain, not perfect, not good But I love you, and every day

That I knew and didn't say

Is lost time

Now I'm knocking down your door

'Cause I'm trying to make up for

Lost time ... Nothing lasts forever, but let's see how far we get

So when it comes my time to lose you

I'll have made the most of it ... I hear you singing in the shower

It's the song I showed you years ago

It's nice to know you listen to it after all this time

Bullseye

You're a bullseye, and I aimed right

I'm a straight shot, you're a grand prize

It was young love, it was dumb luck

Holdin' each other so tight, we got stuck I'll miss borrowin' your books to read your notes in the margin

The closest I came to readin' your mind

The answers to the questions only made more questions

I hope you're never fully satisfied

But I wanted to be there the day you figured it all out

Whoever is, I hope they're proud

... Found some of your stuff at the new house

Packed it on accident when I was movin' out

Probably wrong to think of them as your gifts to me

More like victims of my sentimentality

Man, it's hard to quit while you're ahead

Lettin' the best-laid plans become empty threats

But I meant every word I said, when I said it The world that we built meant the world to me

When one world ends, the other worlds keep spinnin'

Big Deal

I'm surprised that you're the one who said it first

If you had waited a few years, I would've burst

Everything comes up to the surface in the end

Even the things we'd rather leave unspoken

...

You knew when you caught me reading at your show

I knew when you came to visit in the cold

We could've done something that we'd come to regret

Do you remember? You say, "How could I forget?"

...

But we both know that it would never work

You've got your girl, you're gonna marry her

And I'll be watching in a pinstriped suit

Not even wishing it was me and you

So what changes, if anything?

Maybe everything can stay the same

But if we never talk about it again

There's something I want you to understand You are a big deal