Lucy Dacus

Lucy Dacus reminds me of scraped knees.

She’s one of those songwriters that lingers with you.
You think you’ve healed yourself, you’ve moved on, you’re good.
Then you stand up and take a step and realize your skin is still too tight for your bones and the wind stings as it kisses your battered kneecaps.
That’s Lucy.

She’s that sweet sting of remembering.
That slight ache that reminds you that you’re alive.
That you’ve survived.

“The first time I tasted somebody else’s spit, I had a coughing fit.”

“Night Shift” was the Lucy Dacus song that pinned me against the wall. It still does.
It’s a six minute Lyrical Odyssey of angst, betrayal, and heartbreak.
Lucy writes songs that are literary.

Lucy doesn’t tell you that kissing someone else felt wrong, instead, she suffocates you with humanity in the most beautiful way.
It wasn’t just kissing someone else, it was tasting their spit. And it didn’t just feel wrong, it sent her into a coughing fit.
And those are just the opening lyrics to this song.
She spends the next six minutes ripping your heart out over and over again.

“You’ve got a 9-5, so I’ll take the night shift. And I’ll never see you again if I can help it. In 5 years I hope the songs feel like covers, dedicated to new lovers.”

I’ll spend the rest of my life changing everything around me, just so I can avoid you. I’ll take the night shift. And in five years time, all of the songs that I have for you, that I wrote for you, won’t feel like mine anymore. They’ll feel like covers of songs by other people, and they won’t be for you anymore. They’ll be dedicated to new lovers.

Musically, this song is masterful.
It ebbs and flows and organically builds to one huge musical catharsis that feels so good to sing you’d swear this song was etched into your bones, always being a part of your fabric.

Songwriters might catch a song like this once in their lifetime, but this is Lucy’s entire discography.
All of her songs are beautifully poetic, vibrantly visceral, and achingly relatable.

Lucy found me in the springtime of 2021, so it felt awfully kismet that in June of 2021, she released her latest album. If I had to describe how the year 2021 felt, I would play you this record. There are major themes on this album of growing pains, examining spirituality and sexuality, desire, and a terrifying cold rage that errupts in a few moments. Home Video is an album that has perfect timing.

(Also just a personal note, Lucy Dacus was my most played artist of 2021. Harry Styles will most likely be my most played artist of 2022 with his latest album Harry’s House. It’s not lost on me that my two favorite artists of the moment have released albums that center around home, finding oneself, reflection, and change.)

On a rainy October 11th, 2021, my friend Kayla and I met up at The Vic in Chicago to see Lucy, live and in the flesh. This show was unlike any other live music experience I’ve ever had. It was incredibly intimate, transparent, and absolutely spellbinding. First of all, it felt kind of like a gift that we were in the audience to begin with. At this point on her tour, Lucy had to reschedule a few of her shows because her guiarist caught COVID. She could have rescheduled the show at The Vic, but instead, she called in a few favors from the traveling musicians that were on tour with her, rearranged some of her songs, and pulled a few covers out from under her sleeves, to give something that I don’t think I’ll ever experience again.

One moment that I haven’t stopped thinking about since last October, was when Lucy cleared the stage. It was just her and her guitar, and for the first time ever, she performed a cover of “Summer in the City” by Regina Spektor. I swear to God, I’ve never really experienced the “you could have heard a pin drop” phenomenon until that moment. The way Lucy had the crowd completely quiet, completely enthralled and invested in that moment. Lucky for you, she recently recorded a version of this cover for Fender and you can listen and watch it here.

I’ve also never experienced a crowd like the Lucy Dacus concert crowd. When she chose to perform an unreleased song near the end of her set, and she told the audience “Everyone put your phones away” to prevent the song from being leaked, I thought for sure some asshole would lift up his cellphone to record the whole thing, but that never happened. It was like we all knew in that moment that this was a special thing, just for us to have.

Watching Lucy on stage, and seeing how transparent she was with her audience, how she was still slightly awkward, in the most endearing way offered the sweetest kind of intimacy as an audience member. It was like being welcomed into Lucy’s living room. We were all there to hang out with her for an hour. This wasn’t a performance. It was just a bunch of friends getting together to listen. I’ve never experienced that before.

It was also incredibly validating to watch her perform as a musician. To see her fumble a few chords and start the verse over, was such a reckoning for me. She wasn’t ashamed in not being perfect. I could see the cracks in her veneer and it made me love her even more. She was a little nervous for this performance without her guitarist and she let us know that. She was so generous with sharing herself with us that it created this incredibly vibrant environment that felt like home.

When I think about being young and growing up with my mom as she shared her music with me, I remember her playing Alanis Morissette. I remember thinking “Alanis is like my mom’s best friend”. I saw the way that Alanis’ songs made my mom feel seen and understood, so seen and understood that she was eager to share that same feeling with her daughter. I like to think of Lucy as my Alanis, if that makes any sense. I think if someone needed to understand who I was as a person, I’d point them to Lucy’s music. If they needed to understand why live music is so precious and why I love music so much, I’d take them to Lucy Dacus concert.

I’d take them, and their scraped knees, and I’d bring them home with me.