Lucy Dacus Returns: Forever Is A Feeling is a Gallery of Emotions
Forever Is A Feeling, the fourth album by singer-songwriter Lucy Dacus, is finally here. The record marks her return to solo projects after working and touring with boygenius over the last few years.
The album opens with Calliope Prelude, a short taster track made up of only classical strings. It begins softly, with different countermelodies coming in until the music swells to its peak. The name Calliope could allude to both the Greek Muse and the hummingbird, indicating a focus on art and a reference to a lyric in the boygenius song, We’re In Love which also mentions hummingbirds. In Big Deal, Dacus writes about confessing feelings of forbidden love and accepting whatever outcome in the interest of honesty. The song has a soft energy and a slow tempo to ease listeners into the album.
The third and fourth tracks were released in January as a double single, with a music video for Ankles starring Dacus and Havana Rose Liu. The song sums up sensuality, combining sexual and domestic fantasy in daydreams about a romantic muse. It is rather upbeat, merging pop and classical genres with a rhythmic string section. Limerence, its B-side, is a much more subdued track. A pretty piano ballad, it lays the groundwork for Dacus’ honest, confessional songwriting in its contemplation and delaying of a breakup.
Dacus wrote the next song, Modigliani, about bandmate and friend Phoebe Bridgers. Despite its specificity, it has the universal message of missing someone and knowing them really well, with lyrics like “you make me homesick for places I’ve never been before.” Bridgers even contributed vocal harmonies to the song, adding another layer to the quick, witty lyrics. Talk was the final single released before the rest of the album, and is set apart by its dark, rock sound. The musical accompaniment effectively punctuates the vocals and builds up to the final chorus. The song discusses a strained relationship as the speaker struggles to understand what went wrong.
With For Keeps, Dacus slips back into a soft acoustic style. The song expresses an awareness of the ephemerality of a situationship: “I know we’re not playing for keeps.” The title track of the album, Forever Is A Feeling, catalogues a love story from making the first move through to knowing that it is permanent—in direct lyrical contrast to the previous song. Its low rhythmic strings and high countermelodies are not unusual for this album, but the key change and instrumental shift in the chorus add an element of surprise to complement this new “feeling” of “forever.” Come Out is another acoustic track, its title a play on the phrase associated with hide and seek: “Come out, come out, wherever you are.” The premise of the song is the speaker looking for her lover and wanting to be physically together all the time.
Best Guess was released as a single in February and was perhaps the most anticipated song after its live debut in October on International Lesbian Day. It is about acknowledging that life is uncertain but committing to a romantic relationship anyway: “You are my best guess at the future.” The only credited collaboration on the album, Bullseye features Hozier. This acoustic song depicts a dialogue between exes who want to be on good terms but are unsure how to navigate their relationship in its new form. Hozier’s vocals complement Dacus’ as they sing with and to each other.
Sonically, Most Wanted Man is a departure from the rest of the album on account of its country influences (because of the lyric “most wanted man in Tennessee”). The song is about Dacus’ bandmate and friend-turned-girlfriend Julien Baker, who is from Tennessee. Like Bridgers earlier in the album, Baker sings background vocals towards the end of this song about finding love in the everyday details. The final track begins with a slow, acoustic sound as Dacus sings about trying to make up for lost time with a loved one. There is a shift in production at the end to electric instruments. She closes out the album with this big sound to match the big feelings. Still, the last few lines of the song are replaced by a soft voice memo recording, which expertly takes listeners back to the intimacy of the album as a whole.
Forever Is A Feeling delves into a range of feelings through the poetry of Dacus’ songwriting. Whether fans find themselves falling in love, falling out of love, or missing a friend, there are emotions for everyone to connect with. Musically, this album reflects Dacus’ gallery aesthetic for the project: classical, artistic and able to capture the singular.
