The second album from Sabrina Teitelbaum, aka Blondshell, borrows its title from a 1986 poem by the cherished American writer Mary Oliver, titled “Dogfish.” In the poem, Oliver grapples with the idea of telling one’s own story: how much to share, how much to keep for oneself — all questions Teitelbaum asked herself while writing If You Asked For A Picture. “There’s a part of the poem that says: I don’t need to tell you everything I’ve been through. It’s just another story of somebody trying to survive,” Teitelbaum says. “Something I love about songs is that you’re showing a snapshot of a person or a relationship, and showing a glimpse into a story can be just as important as trying to capture the entire thing. Sometimes it’s even truer to the entire picture than if you tried to write everything down.”
Blondshell’s self-titled 2023 debut unleashed a swiss-army-knife writing style that gets under your skin: songs that are as visceral and anthemic as pop music with all the specificity, self-examination, and nonchalant humor of the best indie rock — songs you want to let crash over you, even as their strength is too concrete to be washed...
The second album from Sabrina Teitelbaum, aka Blondshell, borrows its title from a 1986 poem by the cherished American writer Mary Oliver, titled “Dogfish.” In the poem, Oliver grapples with the idea of telling one’s own story: how much to share, how much to keep for oneself — all questions Teitelbaum asked herself while writing If You Asked For A Picture. “There’s a part of the poem that says: I don’t need to tell you everything I’ve been through. It’s just another story of somebody trying to survive,” Teitelbaum says. “Something I love about songs is that you’re showing a snapshot of a person or a relationship, and showing a glimpse into a story can be just as important as trying to capture the entire thing. Sometimes it’s even truer to the entire picture than if you tried to write everything down.”
Blondshell’s self-titled 2023 debut unleashed a swiss-army-knife writing style that gets under your skin: songs that are as visceral and anthemic as pop music with all the specificity, self-examination, and nonchalant humor of the best indie rock — songs you want to let crash over you, even as their strength is too concrete to be washed away. It’s a formula that turned Blondshell into one of the most lauded new artists in recent memory. If You Asked For A Picture expands these artistic horizons further, resulting in a collection of songs from an artist now at the peak of her powers that brim with an urgency, ambition, and devastating potency only hinted at until now.
If You Asked For A Picture is alive with a more vital nuance both sonically and thematically, gesturing towards a deeper autobiographical story that taps into something painfully universal without being too overt. Teitelbaum explains, “The first record feels really black-and-white to me. This record has more questions.” The lucid songs of If You Asked For A Picture dig into familial relationships — parents who pass on their trauma (as in “23’s A Baby”), the endless two-way critique between mothers and daughters (the alt-rock daydream “What’s Fair”), and the loyalty of a sister who won’t forget how a man wronged you (the crushingly catchy accidental-love story “T&A”). Teitelbaum acknowledges her inherent imperfections while trying to extend compassion for the flaws in others. “The last record was a lot of, ‘You’re the villain in this situation, you’ve wronged me, and I’m really pissed’” she says. “On this record it was more like: ‘How did I get here? Maybe I’m the villain too.’ There was something freeing in that.” A major theme of If You Asked For A Picture is control — and the possibility of loosening her grip on it — including two songs (“Thumbtack,” “Toy”) that touch on Teitelbaum’s lifelong struggle with OCD.
In the studio, Teitelbaum found herself confident and at home like never before, trusting her instincts as she developed an almost telekinetic shorthand with producer Yves Rothman. The result is a record of astounding sonic range – including sky-scraping ballads and colossal hooks that soar over waves of distortion, mixing layered textures and harmonic flourishes, or making unexpected hairpin turns between them. Primary among her production touchstones were unexpected curveballs like Queens of the Stone Age’s Rated R and Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Californication. Teitelbaum reveled in appropriating those hyper-masculine aesthetics for her uncompromising examinations of young womanhood, playing with performances of gender in rock. “It’s empowering for me to use sonic references that feel reserved for men,” she explains.
If You Asked for a Picture’s acoustic opener “Thumbtack” is a bittersweet gut-punch of self-reckoning amid an uneasy relationship. “So much of the last record was about finding myself in relationships I didn’t want to be in and not knowing why,” Teitelbaum says. “‘Thumbtack’ is one of those songs, but this record is more about finding out why and trying to be in different types of relationships.” Who among us can’t relate to longing for someone even as they prove to be “a thumbtack in my side,” as Teitelbaum sings on the song’s slyly gigantic hook? “You’re not even a good friend,” she sings, a classic Blondshell mic-drop.
Bone-deep revelations like these have become a Blondshell hallmark — startling clarity, comforting wit — and If You Asked For A Picture is full of them. “I don’t want to be your mom, but you’re not strong enough,” she sings before the tidal chorus of “Arms.” On the clear-eyed “What’s Fair,” she examines a complex maternal relationship (“I grew up fast without you”), trying to empathize even as she refuses to sweep the truth under the rug. “You always had a reason to comment on my body,” she sings, like a century of mother-daughter exchanges compressed to 10 words. Teitelbaum addresses body image throughout the record, whether observing her own changing shape or admitting “part of me still sits at home in a panic over fifteen pounds” on “Event of a Fire,” a road narrative that builds to a blaze of brutal candor, capturing a kind of cinematic back-seat interiority.
In the time since Blondshell, the image of Teitelbaum’s life has changed considerably. As the accolades accrued — late-night TV performances, countless year-end accolades, landing on Obama’s Best Songs of 2023 list, covering Talking Heads for A24’s Stop Making Sense tribute — Teitelbaum spent two years on the road. She played 150+ shows in support of her debut, including major festivals and a tour with Liz Phair on top of her own sold-out headline dates. This rootlessness naturally impacted Teitelbaum’s relationships with others and with herself. “When you travel a lot, you see different possibilities for who you can be,” Teitelbaum says. “So there were a lot more questions coming up. What do I want my life to look like? Maybe it’s just the nature of being two years older, but I’m more comfortable with nuance now, and I’m more comfortable with gray areas.” There’s an open-endedness to where If You Asked For A Picture lands: it’s a no-skips, triumphant sophomore record that captures the unresolved process of figuring out who you are, too wise to suggest that it has a definitive answer.
