LogFAQs > #957380298

18. Phoebe Bridgers I Know the End (2020)
from the album Punisher

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJ9-xN6dCW4

Key lyrics:
Im always pushing you away from me
But you come back with gravity

Led Zeppelins Stairway to Heaven is a song I always wished I could love as much as I respect. The idea of this drawn out, quiet epic exploding into a moment of cathartic release is a killer idea, but it does not stick the landing for me. The payoff weighs heavier than the slow build. Led Zeppelin excelled at hard rock, but something about the middle section collapses under the weight for me. Someone out there had to be able to do better.

While listening through Phoebe Bridgers Punisher album for the first time last year, I Know the End erupted as an unexpected but immediate answer. Where Led Zeppelin were hard rockers momentarily restraining themselves, Phoebe Bridgers is a quiet folk artist pushed to a boiling point. When I Know the End begins, there is no inherent anticipation for more Bridgers could coast off that initial energy to an equally quiet endpoint. But then we reach the second section and the pace picks up while strings join the previously sparse arrangement. Soon, Sufjan Stevens-style horns set us on a point of no return. Where I find the middle sequence of Stairway to Heaven to be a chore, the middle here is perfection. And, against all odds, this seemingly meek folk singer closes out with an adrenaline-fueled crescendo of absolute terror.

Despite being recorded earlier, I Know the End serves as a perfect encapsulation of the nightmare that was 2020. After a personal introduction, stark descriptions of the American South set up an apocalyptic tone she remarks upon a billboard reading The End is Near before stating it has already arrived. In the year of COVID-19, this was a wounding blow, and that cathartic scream which closes the song out is a feeling everyone could understand.

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My top 100 games (with write-ups): https://foolfantastic.com/top-100-video-games-project/