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        <p class="p1">L&rsquo;OFFICIEL USA&rsquo;s Spring 2021 digital coverstar Phoebe Bridgers has experienced more than her fair share of teenage angst. Now an adult, the Grammy nominee has a newfound sense of agency. Bridgers reflects on how far she has come.</p>
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        <p><strong>Photography Daria Kobayashi Ritch</strong></p>
        <p><strong>Styled by Maryam Malakpour </strong></p>
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        <p><span>Before Phoebe Bridgers was smashing guitars in custom Gucci on </span><span><a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/film-tv/snl-john-krasinski-phoebe-bridgers-first-shows-2021" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><em>Saturday Night Live</em></a> </span><span>and collaborating with indie legends like <a href="https://pitchfork.com/features/5-10-15-20/the-music-that-made-bright-eyes-conor-oberst/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Conor Oberst</a>, she played bass in <a href="https://www.instagram.com/sloppyjanebandd/?hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Sloppy Jane</a>, the alt-rock outfit fronted by her high school best friend, Haley Dahl. Though Dahl has since expanded the band to include 11 members&mdash;often taking the stage herself wearing nothing but blue paint&mdash;the two musicians spent their formative years in a state of constant experimentation, eventually finding a sound and performance style all their own.</span></p>
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                <p><span>Growing up in Los Angeles, the pair had their own remedies for fighting teenage boredom and suburban ennui. &ldquo;We would ditch class and do absolutely nothing,&rdquo; says Dahl. &ldquo;We never actually did anything cool; one time we just sat in Phoebe&rsquo;s car and ate a tub of cookies.&rdquo; Bridgers interjects: &ldquo;And then later we crashed my car&mdash;or </span><span>I </span><span>crashed my car. I remember the smoke was billowing up, the shock was setting in, and the first words out of your mouth were, &lsquo;Dude, you&rsquo;re crunched.&rsquo;&rdquo; </span></p>
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      <p><span>Of course, Bridgers has come a long way since her days of cutting class to loiter at Amoeba Records, trading house shows and folk festivals for global stages. The 26-year-old&rsquo;s Grammy-nominated sophomore album, </span><a href="https://open.spotify.com/album/2xECuqnvvmVktV7UO8Dd3s" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><em>Punisher</em></a><span>, arrived in 2020 during the thick of the pandemic, a haunting dissection of death, sex, and self-destruction&mdash;and a near-perfect soundtrack to the languid hopelessness that wove itself through a year of upheaval and uncertainty. Though Bridgers and Dahl are now on opposite sides of the country&mdash;Bridgers at home in Los Angeles and Dahl in Brooklyn&mdash;the two manage to reconvene over video chat to reminisce about high school, being a woman in music, and their many stupid ideas. </span></p>
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      <p><span>SABRINA ABBAS: </span><span><em>You both have known each other since high school; what was it like to be in each others&rsquo; lives during such a formative period?</em></span></p>
      <p><span>HALEY DAHL: </span><span>Everything at that time felt like weird false starts. Every day we would tell ourselves, </span><em>Today is gonna be the day that something crazy happens</em><span><em>, </em>and no matter how hard we tried, nothing ever did. When you&rsquo;re young you just want so badly for your life to be interesting when it&rsquo;s just not. And you </span><span>destroy </span><span>yourself to try and make it interesting. I feel like you, Phoebe, were always someone that I would go to right after I fucked something up really badly. Like, I went over to your house right after setting my ex-boyfriend&rsquo;s synths on fire. </span></p>
      <p><span>PHOEBE BRIDGERS: </span><span>We both had <a href="https://mashable.com/article/what-is-himbo-meme/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">himbo</a> boyfriends in high school. Which I mean in the most loving way possible. We all went to <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/film-tv/maude-apatow-photography-euphoria-finale-2019" target="_blank" rel="noopener">prom</a> together and blasted &ldquo;Free Bird&rdquo; out of your boyfriend&rsquo;s car. </span></p>
      <p><span>HD: </span><span>Our prom was annoyingly on a yacht and the music wasn&rsquo;t good, so once the boat docked, we left and slow danced in the parking lot, because we wanted to actually do the prom thing. </span></p>
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<p class="p1">It&rsquo;s hard to tell what&rsquo;s a joke anymore because I have surrounded myself with people who trust me, and I also trust my own intuition.</p>

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      <p><span>SA: </span>That&rsquo;s<em> </em><span><em>the coming-of-age movie moment.</em><br /></span><span></span></p>
      <p><span>PB: </span><span>That&rsquo;s what we wanted, and we never got it!<br /></span><span></span></p>
      <p><span>HD: </span><span>When you&rsquo;re young you want these moments where everything aligns and something special happens, and we all synchronized and decided to have this school-ending moment together.</span></p>
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            <p><span>SA: </span><em>Phoebe, you&rsquo;ve said that Haley once made the wisest insight into being a creative: that the strongest ideas often first start out as jokes or stupid concepts. What would you both say are your greatest bad ideas?</em></p>
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                  <p><span>HD: </span><span>As that&rsquo;s one of my main weird philosophies, I can&rsquo;t even discern anymore what was a stupid idea to begin with. My work in nature is very ridiculous, so I feel like most things started as something stupid. I did make a record where I dragged a piano and an orchestra into a cave&mdash;something I threatened to do in a melodramatic moment after I got my <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/art/contemporary-art-interview-bunny-rogers-andra-ursuta" target="_blank" rel="noopener">heart broken</a>&mdash;but then I actually did it. Most of the stuff that I do is like that, where I meant it as a cartoon but then I actually followed through. </span></p>
                  <p><span>PB: </span><span>Recently I thought, </span><span><em>Wouldn&rsquo;t it be stupid if I <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/phoebe-bridgers-snl-smashed-guitar-glaad-auction-1154434/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">broke a guitar on stage</a>?</em> </span><span>Because I don&rsquo;t make that kind of music. It&rsquo;s hard to tell what&rsquo;s a joke anymore because I have surrounded myself with people who trust me, and I also trust my own intuition more, but it used to be that I would throw something out as a joke just to see if people thought it was a bad idea. Like when you first start seeing someone and you say, &ldquo;Wouldn&rsquo;t it be funny if we kissed?&rdquo; </span></p>
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<p>&nbsp;<span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0px;">SA:<em> </em></span><em><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0px;">You&rsquo;ve tweeted in the past about how hating bands like The 1975 and Bright Eyes is &ldquo;sexist.&rdquo; Why do you think that is?</span></em></p>
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      <p><span>PB: </span><span>A band like The 1975 will get a horrible review and then sell out Madison Square Garden because teenage girls invented what is cool and popular. Conor [Oberst from Bright Eyes] would always get people saying &ldquo;My girlfriend really loves your music&rdquo; to him.</span></p>
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            <p><span>HD: </span><span>It&rsquo;s funny, because you see these musicians just now getting their due. I recently had a guy friend hit me up and say, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m not cool anymore because I realized that the new Hayley Williams record is good,&rdquo; but she&rsquo;s </span><span>always </span><span>been good. People didn&rsquo;t take it seriously when it was happening because it was &ldquo;girl music.&rdquo; </span></p>
            <p><span>PB: </span><span>I was dating a metalhead when I was around 13, and I asked him what he thought about <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/music/pop-punk-resurgence-music-fashion-tiktok" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Paramore</a>, and he said it was stupid and that Hayley Williams is just &ldquo;a chick who dances around.&rdquo; I also think that wearing a stage costume is so weirdly gendered, even though <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/kurt-cobain-90s-grunge-style-impact" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kurt Cobain</a> wore a costume too&mdash;he thought about what t-shirt he was going to wear to every single red carpet. Bruce Springsteen is also wearing a costume&mdash;and metal? Don&rsquo;t even get me started. Those dudes are wearing eyeliner, but somehow Hayley Williams flipping her hair around is not hardcore? It&rsquo;s such a crazy double standard about who&rsquo;s allowed to dress up or not. </span></p>
            <p><span>HD: </span><span>It&rsquo;s also this idea that men performing femininity is somehow a cool choice, but women performing femininity is a non-choice. And I love <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/david-bowie-style-2021-fashion-makeup-trends" target="_blank" rel="noopener">David Bowie</a>, but he&rsquo;s hailed as this performance genius when women who do similar things are seen as weird, out-there, costumey, and experimental, rather than doing genius character work. </span></p>
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      <p><span>SA: </span><em>Did the band have any traditions when you performed together in Sloppy Jane?</em></p>
      <p><span>HD: </span><span>I really liked being an asshole, and I wanted our old shows to feel like hostage situations. We had a TV on stage, and I liked to make us all &ldquo;fall asleep&rdquo; at the end of shows and leave the TV playing to see how long people would stand there for. People would stay for a half hour and we&rsquo;d be stuck on stage because people thought they were watching performance art. </span></p>
      <p><span>PB: </span><span>One time I just got up and went home. I feel like I was very, very bad at bass. We were playing house shows with trash fires, though, so I don&rsquo;t think anyone noticed.</span></p>
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<p class="p1">Wearing a stage costume is so weirdly gendered, even though Kurt Cobain wore a costume too&mdash;he thought about what t-shirt he was going to wear to every single red carpet.</p>

<p><span>SA: </span><span><em>Stage theatrics are a big part of Sloppy Jane.</em></span></p>
<p><span>HD: </span><span>Yeah, the thing that sucks with stage theatrics is that no matter what you do, it changes the standard. I do a lot of crazy stuff on stage, which makes people then critique what I do on stage.<br /></span><span></span></p>
<p><span>PB: </span><span>People were kind of reductive with Sloppy Jane, commenting on how the blue paint was so amazing when you just played an awesome eight-minute piano ballad. It was always dudes, too. One time I brought my friend to a Sloppy Jane show, and he was looking at me, and I was looking at him, and there was paint and you were naked and I was like, &ldquo;Yeah, it&rsquo;s fucking wild.&rdquo; And he just goes, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s so hot.&rdquo; I mean, what? You&rsquo;re literally vomiting paint into a microphone. When stuff gets misinterpreted, that&rsquo;s my least favorite thing.</span></p>
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      <p><span>HD: </span><span>Right, like people saying that &ldquo;Sloppy Jane is <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/beauty/lyle-xox-rizzoli-april-2019" target="_blank" rel="noopener">performance art</a>.&rdquo; No, stop, actually it&rsquo;s not. I </span><span>was </span><span>just being a dick, Phoebe </span><span>was </span><span>just being a dick. Everyone is just being a dick. Performing is fun because you can do whatever you want. That, too, is what I think is meaningful about it. People assign a lot of unnecessary meaning to what you do onstage, when really what I think is cathartic about seeing someone perform is knowing that they&rsquo;re doing what they want to be doing.</span></p>
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      <p><span>SA:<em> </em></span><span><em>What role does fashion and personal style play in performance for you?</em><br /></span><span></span></p>
      <p><span>HD: </span><span>I personally always like to wear the same thing for each cycle I&rsquo;m going through. It helps put me in the mindset of becoming whatever I am at the time. I&rsquo;m super gross, too, like I won&rsquo;t wash the stuff I wear onstage. I have my one outfit that&rsquo;s just disgusting. My onstage outfit right now is this blue velvet suit that looks super nice from far away, but is actually an Austin Powers <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/pop-culture/best-celebrity-halloween-hollywood-costume-inspiration" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Halloween costume</a> I got tailored. </span></p>
      <p><span>PB: </span><span>It looks like Gucci to me, honestly. It looks like something <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/men/jared-leto-interview-finneas-billie-eilish-morbius" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jared Leto</a> would wear in a <a href="https://www.lofficielusa.com/fashion/gucci-aria-film-alessandro-michele-balenciaga" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gucci</a> ad. But I feel the same exact way about a costume. I make my whole band wear suits, and I love wearing fancy things. I made [Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker of] boygenius wear matching costumes&mdash;they were very down&mdash;and now I have this keepsake forever. It marks an era and is a memory of that time, and it also becomes this ritual of doing your hair and makeup for the first time that day at 7 p.m. and becoming your stage self. </span></p>
      <p><span>HD: </span><span>I always talk about how consistency is the best punchline. Like if you say you&rsquo;re going to wear something forever, it only becomes more true the more times you put it on. It&rsquo;s the same thing with costumes. At first people may not get it, but eventually it becomes your signature. </span></p>
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      <p><span><strong>HAIR</strong> </span><span>Nikki Providence <br /></span><strong>MAKEUP </strong><span>Gloria Noto <br /></span><strong>DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY</strong> Mark Underwood <br /><strong>PRODUCTION </strong><span>Dana Brockman </span><span>VIEWFINDERS</span><span><br /><strong>PROPS STYLIST</strong> </span><span>Daniel Horowitz<br /></span><span><strong>FLORAL DESIGN</strong> </span><span>Brittany Asch, BRRCH<br /></span><strong>PRODUCTION COORDINATOR </strong>Molly O&rsquo;Brien<br /><strong>PHOTO ASSISTANTS </strong><span>David Lopez and Derec Patrick <br /></span><strong>STYLIST ASSISTANT </strong><span>Tallulah Brown <br /></span><strong>PROPS ASSISTANT </strong><span>Jade Sorenson </span></p>
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Phoebe Bridgers is a Free Bird

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