Lucy Dacus has returned with an über-90s new single called “Kissing Lessons.” Take a listen below.
A tale both incredibly niche and way too common, “Kissing Lessons” takes us back to Dacus’ girlhood, when she and her best friend, too young for boys, prepared for their future relationships with each other. “She called me by the name of her crush/ I couldn’t decide if she was Cole or Justin/ I think I called her baby or darling most of the time,” Dacus sings, blurring the lines between friendship and romance. “We’d take turns being seduced/ Imagining the day it would come into use/ Imagining the day we’d start breaking hearts and taking names.”
While fuzz guitar buzzes over tinny, compressed drums, Mara Palena’s music video completes “Kissing Lessons”‘ retro feel, as a girl — dressed to the nines in a sunflower choker and heart-shaped sunglasses — lounges around among a collage of notebook doodles. By the short single’s end, Dacus manages to bring up all those complex feelings all over again, as she recalls: “Rachel’s family moved out of town/ I don’t remember when we stopped hanging out/ But I still wear a letter R charm on my bracelet/ And wonder if she thinks of me as her first kiss.”
“Kissing Lessons,” along with Dacus’ recent single “Thumbs Again,” will be released on 7-inch vinyl on June 3rd. You can preorder the vinyl here. It marks her first release since last summer’s exceptional album Home Video.
Next week, Dacus will head out on a North American tour, including a newly announced date July 21st concert at New York’s Central Park. Tickets are on sale now via Ticketmaster.
