Watch Phoebe Bridgers’ Willfully Ridiculous Colbert Performance
For the past few months, Phoebe Bridgers has been trying to promote her great new album Punisher while in quarantine, which doesn’t seem like an easy thing to do. Bridgers has taken on the challenge by making the whole thing as ridiculous as possible. In her late-night talk show appearances, for instance, Bridgers has been putting on deeply goofy performances: Singing in her bathtub on Kimmel, singing from her car on Corden. Last night, Bridgers was the musical guest on Stephen Colbert’s Late Show, and she might have given her silliest performance yet.
On Colbert, Bridgers sang “Kyoto,” the same song that she already did on Kimmel. This time, she was in a living room made up to look like a cheap nightclub: Mirror ball, colored lights, glittery curtain. Bridgers then gave an intentionally awkward performance of her own song, coming off like an extremely shy and slightly drunk karaoke-bar patron.
In the video below, Bridgers does some Roger Daltrey mic-chord twirling while two-stepping. She steps up on a stool and then gingerly hops off. She does the Dikembe Mutombo finger-wag. Near the end, she’s joined by a guest in giant glasses. I truly enjoyed this performance. Watch it below.
Punisher is out now on Dead Oceans. Read our feature on Bridgers here.