Vulnerability: Part Two

Vulnerability continues to simmer in my mind as I absorb LP3, Hippo Campus’s new album released only a week ago.

I am an honest person but not an open one. There is a big difference between the two. Among other things, it is difficult for me to explain how important music is to me. I do not feel as if I can open up about it with just anyone; songs reveal so much about you, maybe sometimes even too much. Am I the only one who frantically searches for lyrics on Genius after someone close to me names one of their favorite songs, aching to know which lines resonated with them the most and why?

Acquaintances offer me access to their aux cord, opening up the car ride to a plethora of opportunities to peel myself back layer by layer. To that I say no, whatever you’d like is fine. Because it is. I’m not one to judge other music tastes, especially when it saves me from revealing my own.

However, I like to believe I am a little more vulnerable thanks to music. I realize that my favorite artists the ones who allow themselves to be vulnerable, especially over time.

I’ve listened to Hippo Campus since high school. “Suicide Saturday” is too good to be deemed a guilty pleasure; I can still jam out to that song like it is 2014, as if the world were not in shambles. But the indie rock group has dramatically matured with each new record: their sound and lyrics on LP3 feel completely different.

This is not to say their earlier works were not vulnerable. The lyrics to “Boyish,” the first single from the group’s debut album, address the lead singer’s experiences with the Mormon church and his parents' divorce. Heavy stuff. At the time this felt bold compared to their previous EPs, as if it were not all sunshine and rainbows for these happy-go-lucky Minnesotan boys:

Daddy’s coming home but momma’s looking guilty
Brother’s in the basement ‘til he’s thirty
Wolf child’s heavy with the weight of the world
Storing all his love in an adolescent girl

​ There’s sunlight dripping off the apricot tree
Lost to the night tide growing in me
Singing to the drunks like they’re mom and dad
All we ever knew is what we didn’t have

Never really knew if I did something wrong
All I ever heard was “it wasn’t my fault”
But what good is truth if you don’t understand
Nothing but a pair of calloused hands?

However, “Boyish” now feels like it was more experimental. After all, not everyone is eager to unravel traumatic life experiences on the first record they release to the world. Such a move could alienate them from their fanbase, which was young not only figuratively but also literally: many of them, like the band members, were barely twenty years old, if that.

Even Bambi is nowhere near as raw as the group’s more recent releases. Hippo Campus paused for two years after releasing their sophomore album, eventually returning in 2021 to unveil “Bad Dream, Baby.” Jake Luppen actively confronts in this stream of consciousness not only the death of his childhood dog, a token for his parents’ divorce

Happy Valentine’s Day to you
Hope it’s better than mine
‘Cause my dog’s about to die, yeah
Got her back when I was 15
My parents split up so they gave her to me
My consolation prize, a real dream
But she always liked my momma better

but also his (non-existent) relationship with his father and Britney Spears’s conservatorship:

I’m worried about Britney Spears
It’s pretty fucked up how her dad runs her life
I wish my dad was more involved in mine
But not like that, really not like that, yeah

Pretty bold, right? But this song is no exception.

We might think the group is simply being more blunt in its lyrics. However, last year Luppen revealed in a Billboard interview that he identifies as queer, which to my knowledge he never hinted at before. He explores his relationship with sexuality in “Boys,” the first song from LP3 that describes how it feels to hit rock bottom in New York. I love how the chorus

Kissing boys, missing work
Got hungover from your words
Same New York, it’s the worst
All these nights are a blur
Going broke, make it rain
Ain’t got nobody to blame
All this time down the drain

ends with the line “I’m the best at insane.”

I have had the pleasure of seeing Hippo Campus live several times in past years. I have met all the band members. Of course I do not know them personally; I do not consider any artist I like my friend or anything like that. I have been to hundreds of shows and am still taken aback when the pre-show background music ceases, the lights dim, and the band emerges on stage: these are real people? In front of me? It can’t be.

Even when I am lucky enough to meet artists I adore after the show and somehow find the same words nearly every other fan does to carry on a brief conversation with them – “hi hello i love your music just like everyone else here haha i love how you did x during tonight’s show where did that come from also maybe we can take a photo together okay thank you so so much good night” – I am still not convinced when I get home, after I shower the venue and sweat off me, finally feel my toes again, and nestle into my warm bed to review every photo and video I took that night, that musicians are human like me.

What does it take for me to realize that? Vulnerability. It hit me while listening to this album that musicians also bury things deep within them, potentially for years or for the rest of their lives. Just like anyone else does. I always identified them as spunky guys around my age who were also from the Midwest, infecting the indie music scene with feel-good songs like “Simple Season” and “warm glow.” I remember when fans on Twitter recreated clips of the final tunnel scene in The Perks of Being a Wallflower, replacing The Song with “warm glow.” It feels so right. That was who this band, including the people comprising it, was to me.

This new album is reacquainting me with Hippo Campus, showing me a side of them I never before imagined. I appreciate them and their music so much more for that. This is one of the big reasons why I am so invested in music; I feel myself growing alongside the artists, who make that known through their vulnerability. In many cases I cannot imagine myself opening up like that even to people who know me, so how the fuck do artists have the courage to do so publicly?

Hippo Campus are far from the only example among the artists I love. Foxing’s music has always felt more raw than others, each album reaffirming what I adored about them from the first listen. My favorite song from their newest album, my most-played song last year according to Spotify (an impressive 728 times!) is in my opinion the most vulnerable – “Beacons,” a song about accepting one’s sexuality. Although Conor’s bisexuality and struggles with the Catholic church in which he grew up were not secret, the song feels like a celebration of overcoming, outrightly defying any past shame or uncertainty that lingered even after he came out.

I adore The 1975. I know that’s a controversial opinion especially because Matty Healy is a controversial figure. Regardless of your opinion on him, Matty’s decision to unburden himself from the unspoken weight of his drug addiction was refreshing and admirable. He told DIY Magazine that “when I went away to Barbados, I actually went to rehab. And I should have just said that because it makes me sound like I didn’t wanna say it, but I’ve been telling anybody who’ll fucking listen.” He is in no way ashamed of being vulnerable: “That’s what people want. That’s what I want as well. Tell me the fucking truth . . . and it makes for more interesting art, and that’s what I’m here for now I’ve decided.”

The 1975’s most recent albums, which the group has released since Matty confessed his struggles, have without a doubt been the most interesting. I have connected with them on a personal level more than the first two. That is not to say that the latter do not resonate with me or that mental health struggles are prerequisite to producing interesting art; there is a big difference between romanticizing mental health issues, which unfortunately still plagues the music industry, and being shamelessly yet admirably honest.

In Know My Name Chanel Miller says that it is much easier to come out to someone you don’t know because they don’t harbor “pockets of your past; who you were, what they believed you to be.” Making ourselves known can be uncomfortable, dismantling the identity we already established among the people who do know us, whether they are close friends or fans who gush from afar. It may even risk our finances or reputation.

This vulnerability is not limited to exposing mental health issues; my doctor described in my previous post remains one of my favorite examples, whose resilience as an abortionist and outright advocate for women’s healthcare rights never fades despite practicing in a state that only wants to tear down his efforts. Although this approach differs from that of the artist, both awaken a buried sense of humanity in the public space.

Phoebe Bridgers is another great example of someone who is not afraid to write vulnerably. On tour she hears thousands of fans sing her experiences back to her, which include abuse at the hands of Ryan Adams and her shaky relationship with her father. I appreciate Phoebe’s discussion on vulnerability in songwriting:

When you think to yourself, am I allowed to say that? The answer is yes! If it’s funny, or dark, or fun, you know, I think I never want to hear the word “turpentine” in a song again. Honestly, I don’t want to hear about anybody smoking a cigarette ever again. Like, say the thing that’s specific to you. I guarantee you people will love it . . . I have a lyric about a hypnotherapist, and I was, like, should I? Or is that stupid? Or too weird? Luckily I had a friend who said, “No, this is awesome. You should definitely put that in there.” And now I do that all the time. I love it.

Not having to really explain yourself to somebody hearing a really dark lyric and knowing exactly what it means . . . and then, you know, the best type of competitive, like, Lucy’s new single “Hot and Heavy.” When I hear that I just, I’m so jealous. How did she say that thing that is exactly what I think?

This is a big reason why new music is so enthralling; every song is a new opportunity for an artist to string together words that capture the human condition.

I cherish increased vulnerability in music because it feels like a friend opening up to me, as if the artists themselves have confided in me personally even though thousands of people in a crowd sing the lyrics back to them: the pinnacle of the Dionysian experience.

I liken this process to knocking down a structure. Being vulnerable is like knocking down an entire building for people whose reputations, careers, or safety are at stake. Although I agree with Matty and Phoebe that more people than not will appreciate their openness, there is a nonzero chance that some of their pre-established fans will be turned off. Abortionists earn defaming Internet webpages written by devout Christians. It takes a lot more resources and time to reconstruct that building. But for average folk who simply fear discomfort within themselves or from their peers – not that that cannot be damaging – it is more akin to knocking down a brick fence. Less risky, less time to rebuild.

This gifts me confidence – if public figures can be vulnerable enough to honestly articulate their drug addictions, identity issues, traumatic experiences, and whatever else to the world, or to confidently speak their minds about a risky topic, then why can’t I be open with one friend?

I am excited to see Hippo Campus again next week. Hearing these new songs live will make it feel like I am seeing them for the first time.