Phoebe Bridgers Premieres New Music at First Solo Show Since 2023

[Pitchfork]

By Hattie Lindert

On Friday (May 8), Phoebe Bridgers performed her first live solo show in three years at the Liberty, a 400-capacity theater in Roswell, New Mexico. During the no-phones-allowed performance, Bridgers reportedly played favorites including “Motion Sickness,” “Kyoto,” and “Garden Song,” as well as multiple new songs and a video short previewing her forthcoming (but TBA) third album. She was joined onstage by frequent collaborator Christian Lee Hutson. Check out a full set list below.

Bridgers noted to the crowd that the small-scale set was a “test” for upcoming performances. One of the new songs she premiered allegedly addressed the 2023 death of her father. On May 9, flyers for another Bridgers performance apparently popped up in Lubbock, Texas. Bridgers’ team declined to comment further.

Each attendee at the Roswell show received a small piece of a painting in the lockable pouches phones were kept in; some fans have speculated that together, the fragments reveal Bridgers’ next album cover. New merchandise made available at the performance also appeared to display rumored lyrics from a new song: “Now I can’t see any stars in the sky. When a dream comes true, a fantasy dies…but we’re gonna be alright, me and you.”

Bridgers released her most recent album, Punisher, in 2020, and her most recent new song, “Sidelines,” in 2022 as part of the soundtrack to the Hulu series Conversations With Friends. Since then, she’s collaborated with Rob Moose, the National, Arlo Parks, SZA, Andrew Bird, and more. She has also remained active as a member of boygenius, her supergroup with Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus; in 2024, the trio won three Grammys for their debut album The Record. Her debut solo album, Stranger in the Alps, arrived in 2017.