It’s a Thursday night, and the masses of people filling the New Haven streets are clad with collared shirts, ties, slacks, and button downs. To the untrained eye, it may seem like a corporate seminar is happening nearby. But the presence of all these people assures me that I am headed in the right direction. We are all headed, of course, to the Boygenius concert held at the Westville Music Bowl.
As I take my seat in the upper section of the outdoor stadium, it is only a matter of minutes before an older woman takes center stage and introduces herself. She is Clan Mother Shoran Waupatukuay Piper of the Golden Hill Paugussett Tribe.
She acknowledges that our concert tonight will take place on native land, and honors the Quinnipiac tribe that it originally belonged to.
An applause erupts as the lights slowly dim the stage once again.
Minutes of silence go by and the crowd becomes restless. The stadium is a full house and the energy this crowd’s bringing is palpable.
We’re finally graced with a live camera feed of Phoebe Bridgers, Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker, or the band formally known as boygenius. The three are styled in matching grey suits and crowd around a single handheld microphone, just offstage.
Their setlist kicks off with the first song on their album the record; “Without You Without Them”. The supergroup performs the sweet acapella tune remotely backstage, live-streamed straight to the crowd.
After this mellow opener, they waste no time ambushing the main stage and rolling right into the pop-punk hit; “$20”. The singers happily dance around the stage, all while wielding electric guitars on their waists
They waste no time and chug through an impressive repertoire of songs; “Satanist”, “Emily I’m Sorry” and “True Blue”.
The graphics that accompany these fan favorites are flashy and fast paced images of the boys. They make the audience feel as if we’re flipping through a boygenius scrapbook.
The audience takes their first breath when the action winds down enough to introduce their first acoustic song of the night. The overhead lights take on a soft and comforting glow. It feels like home.
Phoebe and Julien strum out the first few bars of “Cool About It” and a gentle demeanor takes over the stadium. The pit stands still and everyone waits with bated breath. “Met you at the dive bar to go shoot some pool,” Julien sings, and we sing with her. The sweet sounds of “Cool About It” fill the air and shoot up into the night sky. When it comes to Phoebe’s verse, I feel her sing directly to me, reaching across the entire stadium to seat 418. “I ask you how you’re doing and I let you lie”. I notice that a tear slowly rolls from my eye and down to my cheek.
The boys take us on a walk down memory lane, playing many beloved songs from their self-titled 2018 EP; “Souvenir”, “Bite The Hand”, and “Me & My Dog”, all accompanied by live footage of the crowd that resembles an early 2000’s home video.
As we near the end of the night, the supergroup takes turns performing songs each from their respective solo albums and as a parting gift, the trio debuts a soon-to-be released song entitled “Voyager”.
The only thing that could make the night sweeter is a large piece of cake, which many dedicated fans did receive, (albeit straight to their faces) after the whole stadium closed out the show with early happy birthday to Julien, birthday cake and all.
Boygenius not only creates meaningful, raw and vulnerable music for their listeners, but somehow also makes their performances feel like home.
