Lucy Dacus

Singer/songwriter Lucy Dacus first drew attention at the age of 19 with "I Don't Wanna Be Funny Anymore," a 2015 single that established a wry and slightly neurotic personality. A native of Richmond, VA, she studied film at Virginia Commonwealth University and dropped out to pursue music, taking a job at a photography lab. The single brought a flood of immediate attention; she later said that 20 different labels tried to sign her. Instead she stayed indie and made the debut album No Burden with two college friends: Guitarist Jacob Blizard was attending Oberlin and made the album as a winter-break project; coproducer Collin Pastore was working in Nashville with fellow Berklee graduates. The total recording time for the album was 20 hours. She also chose Richmond musician Tyler Williams, from the Head & the Heart, as one of her managers. The album was released on the indie EggHunt to another stack of critical raves, both for the emotional frankness of her lyrics and for the appeal of her music, which drew from acoustic country/folk and post-grunge pop. After a few months of touring she signed with Matador-home of her favorite band, Yo La Tengo-which rereleased the album. She also toured with another Matador songwriter, Julien Baker; the two became close friends and sometime collaborators. With expectations running high, Dacus abandoned a Portland session for her second album and wound up returning to Nashville with most of the team from the debut. The second album Historian wound up even more cathartic than the debut, with songs inspired by the breakup of an abusive relationship (with her former bassist) and, on "Next of Kin," by her first experience of an anxiety attack. The album's March 2018 release received another round of favorable coverage, including a New York Times profile headlined "How an Indie-Rock Star is Made in 2018." She played a successful round of shows at South by Southwest in March and went on a small-venue tour with higher-profile dates.