© Robert Hanashiro/Imagn
Ten years ago, maybe a few thousand people in the music world were familiar with the names Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus.
Fast forward a decade, and their supergroup, Boygenius, is one of the most popular bands in the world. The trio first joined forces in 2018 and put out the “Boygenius EP” shortly after.
Five years later, they released “The Record,” which went on to garner seven Grammy nominations, including three victories. The group is currently on hiatus, but that won’t stop us from counting down the top songs in the Boygenius discography.
The Definitive Top 10 Boygenius Songs
In total, Boygenius has just 32 songs to its credit, including those from the EP, “The Record,” and several unreleased songs. But that doesn’t make putting together this list any easier.
There will undoubtedly be songs that miss this list and anger fans. But guess what? This is our list, and that’s life sometimes!
So without further ado…
Bonus: “You’re Still The One” (Shania Twain Cover)
The list itself is limited to songs actually written by the members of Boygenius, which means this incredible cover of “You’re Still The One” by Shania Twain is technically eligible.
However, any song that almost brings my mother to tears because of how beautiful it is deserves an honorable mention. “You’re Still The One” topped the charts for Shania Twain in 1997, and the boys did it more than justice with this cover, which combines Lucy Dacus’s effortless harmonies with Julien Baker’s subtle but unmissable fingerpicking on the mandolin.
10) “Cool About It”
Starting with a melody reminiscent of “The Boxer” by Simon & Garfunkel is never a bad idea, and this track just takes off from there.
Each of the three artists takes a separate verse to lay out the picture of a relationship that is clearly falling apart, but one which the narrator is trying to remain “cool” about.
Bridgers’ “Once, I took your medication to know what it’s like, and now I have to act like I can’t read your mind” is a standout line that is as equally biting as it is comically on the nose.
9) “Bite The Hand”
The lead track off their first EP, “Bite The Hand,” was, for many, a first introduction to Boygenius, and what an introduction it is.
A simple arrangement complements Dacus’s buttery smooth vocals, while the lyrics describe the painstaking feeling of giving someone your all in a relationship, but lacking the ability to be everything that the other person needs you to be.
As Baker told Billboard, “[It’s] a concise way to express such a complex emotion of loving a person and also having to understand that you can love a person and you can’t all of a sudden become what they need and sacrifice your entire identity and autonomy to become some other thing.”
8) We’re In Love
If we’re up to Baker, this song would have never seen the light of day. But we’re so incredibly glad that it did.
The track, written and voiced by Dacus, is a love letter to both Baker and Bridgers, expressing their importance to not only Dacus but also to one another.
The opening refrain, “You could absolutely break my heart. That’s how I know that we’re in love,” is neither complex nor overwrought, but it lays bare the moment that you know someone has become an important part of your life.
According to Baker, she initially resisted to putting the song on “The Record,” but later relented. She told NPR that accepting the track was part of a learning process for her “to know the difference between being scrutinized and being seen.”
7) “Letter To An Old Poet”
“Letter To An Old Poet” could well have found its way higher up on this list on another day, but for now it slots in at No. 7.
The song represents a remarkable journey of growth for Bridgers, as evidenced by a not-so-subtle call back to another track that will feature higher on this list.
On one hand, the low-fi sound will bring longtime Phoebe Bridgers fans back to her debut album, “Stranger in the Alps,” while the lyrics represent a new, more confident version of herself.
Bridgers once again recalls a story from an unhealthy relationship, which is not uncommon for her music. But this time, it closes not with bitter self-reflection, but rather confident self-belief.
“I wanna be happy, I’m ready, to walk into my room without lookin’ for you,” Bridgers sings in almost triumphant fashion, echoing the thoughts of anybody who has ever worked through a difficult end to a relationship.
6) “Souvenir”
While the popular term “sad boi music” would be an appropriate label for Boygenius on the whole, the term is particularly true of Baker’s writing, especially early in his career.
Her fingerprints are all over “Souvenir,” which was part of the band’s 2018 EP.
The song dabbles in themes of hopelessness and self-loathing, emphasized by Dacus’s final refrain: “Pulling thorns out of my palm. Work a midnight surgery. When you cut a hole into my skull, do you hate what you see, like I do?”
Still, despite the heavy subject matter, the harmonies between the three help cradle the listener, somehow making it feel as if everything is going to be okay.
5) “Stay Down”
If “Souvenir” is an example of the comforting embrace of Baker’s shared sadness, “Stay Down” represents the exact opposite.
The heartbreaking track, which hammers home themes of depression and hopelessness, would feel right at home on either of Baker’s first two solo albums, “Sprained Ankle” or “Turn Out The Lights.”
The song yet again focuses on a failed relationship and Baker’s inability to fix things before it’s too late.
“‘Cause it’s a half-life. It’s a fallout. It takes so long for me to settle down, and when I finally do, there’s no one else around, so I stay down,” she belts over a haunting piano piece in the background.
4) “$20”
Between 2018 and 2023, Baker’s individual music career took an interesting turn. While the themes were still the same, her songs took on a more driving, aggressive, and confident sound.
That’s evident on $20, which she wrote individually in the time between the EP and “The Record.”
Because of that, $20 is probably a solid intro track for anyone looking to get into Boygenius. The driving, punk rock-sounding features a clearly distinguishable opening riff before launching into a song about the narrator’s penchant for seeking out often dangerous situations that they know won’t end well.
While I’d often hesitate to call many Boygenius songs “fun,” that’s not the case with “$20,” which features highly relatable lyrical content coupled with a highly creative vocal arraingement.
3) “Me & My Dog”
Fun’s over!
We talked earlier about Phoebe Bridgers’ personal growth shining through on “Letter To An Old Poet,” which is an extremely thinly veiled callback to “Me & My Dog.”
Much like “Stay Down” and Baker, “Me & My Dog” would feel perfectly at home on a Bridgers solo album. Bridgers revealed to Pitchfork that the closing track from the band’s debut EP was written about a panic attack and the desire to escape the world with her dog, Max, in tow.
Who among us hasn’t had that desire?!
Like in “Letter To An Old Poet,” Bridgers addresses the loss of a relationship and the way it’s made her feel. However, unlike in the latter track, she doesn’t seem ready for happiness or to move on.
“I wanna be emaciated. I wanna hear one song without thinkin’ of you,” Bridgers sings.
Her belting of the fine line, “I dream about it, and I wake up falling” while performing the EP live at Brooklyn Steel, is a defining moment not only for the band, but for its fans as well.
2) “Not Strong Enough”
When your song wins a Grammy for “Best Rock Song,” it’s going to go pretty dang high on any list of your greatest songs. The rules are the rules.
“The Record” was Boygenius’ introduction to a more mainstream audience, and “Not Strong Enough” was the album’s crowning achievement.
“Not Strong Enough” pairs heartwrenching themes of inadequacy and self-hatred and pairs it with an endlessly catchy backing track that will have you casually bobbing your head and singing along before stopping to say: “wait, what?”
After all, who hasn’t stopped at some point in their life to ask, “I don’t know why I am the way I am?”
1) “Salt In The Wound”
While Bridgers and Baker often steal the headlines, it’s Dacus that typically flies under the radar. But that’s not the case here.
On “Salt In The Wound,” Lucy Dacus perfectly lays out what it’s like to constantly be the one in a relationship who is constantly giving, only for that effort to go unreciprocated
This is painfully clear from the opening verse, with heartbreaking lines such as “You add insult to injury. You say you believe in me. But you haven’t decided. About taking or leaving me”
In the chorus, Dacus likens herself to a magician, constantly doing what’s needed to make the relationship work. Meanwhile, her partner offers her praise, but refuses to put in the same effort to make things work
“But you take and you take, like silks up my sleeve. Tied corner to corner, never ending. Trick after trick, I make the magic, and you unrelentingly ask for the secret,” she sings.
The track culminates with an absolutely killer guitar solo by Baker that brought the house down during their iconic Brooklyn Steel show.
“Salt In The Wound” is the quintessential Boygenius song, and it displays all of the elements that have propelled the band to superstardom.