Fresh Tunes Friday: Don’t Forget Me by Maggie Rogers

There will always be the same familiar arguments echoing across the internet, especially in the endless depths of music pages on Facebook and YouTube comment sections: “They just don’t make them like they used to!” It’s the rallying cry of classic rock enthusiasts, nostalgic for something like the raw power of Led Zeppelin or the unpolished brilliance of a band sitting stoned around a microphone from a bygone era. The arguments are often followed by grumbles about the supposed cheating of today’s autotuned, overproduced hits as “not real music.” But these arguments all stem from the same place: A yearning for a return to the simplicity of older sounds, as if music has somehow lost its soul along the way.

But then an album like Don’t Forget Me comes along, and we’re reminded that, maybe, just maybe, someone does still make them like they used to. Maggie Rogers, who’s always worn her influences on her sleeve (she just performed with Joan Baez, after all), manages to create something that both honors the past and creates something undeniably fresh. In this album, her third major release, she continues to step confidently into her own space, blending timeless folk-pop textures with modern narratives that feel rooted in today’s world.

Recorded at New York’s legendary Electric Lady Studios in just five days, Don’t Forget Me leans more into the folk-pop glow of her debut Heard It in a Past Life than the raw, unbridled energy of 2022’s Surrender. Where Surrender felt like an explosion of pent-up emotion, Don’t Forget Me is more deliberate and reflective. It’s not as deeply personal this time around; Rogers isn’t mining her own life for every lyric. Instead, she’s stepping into the shoes of her characters, inhabiting their stories with a certain theatrical flair, letting the narrative do the heavy lifting.

Maggie Rogers Performs at the Minneapolis Armory, February 2023. Photos by Casey Carlson

As Rogers put it in an interview with The New Yorker, this album was about “putting on the uniform” of the people she writes about. In the title track, for example, she nails the bittersweetness of watching friends fall in love while grappling with her own insecurities and fear of being left behind. Then there’s Never Going Home, a more upbeat track where Rogers embodies a ferocity where her character casually navigates the start of a one-night stand following a breakup—a far cry from her usual introspective style. It’s playful, theatrical even, but also shows her willingness to stretch beyond her own lived experiences.

Sonically, the album feels lush and expansive, with a cinematic quality to it that reflects Rogers’ influences (She’s spent time studying albums like Thriller and Rumours track-listing to format this album) And lyrically, there’s a newfound confidence—Rogers leans into using pronouns more often, giving her characters a sense of grounding that feels more direct than anything we’ve heard from her before.

Take So Sick of Dreaming, for instance. It’s a song about a frustrating relationship—her date blows off dinner for a basketball game. But instead of wallowing in disappointment, Rogers’ character shrugs it off, grabs a couple of martinis at the bar, and chooses a night out with friends over a man-child. It’s a narrative with layers, revealing her growing mastery of character-driven songwriting. She’s not just writing songs about herself anymore; she’s creating worlds.

It’s the kind of storytelling that calls to mind songwriters like Bruce Springsteen, who famously admitted that the majority of his song’s characters—factory workers, loser lovers, and hot rod angels—were all figments of his imagination. In his memoir Born to Run and on his Springsteen on Broadway special, Bruce confessed, “Standing before you is a man who has become wildly and absurdly successful writing about things of which he has had… absolutely no personal experience.” He added, “I just made it all up. That’s how good I am.” Rogers is tapping into this same vein in crafting similar, relatable fictional characters, proving that songwriting doesn’t have to be autobiographical to resonate. It’s a skill that a songwriter is often measured by, and one Maggie Rogers is already wise to even if it’s early on in her career: The art of fabrication in service of emotional truth.

Maggie Rogers performs at Hinterland Music Festival in Iowa. August 2019. Photos by Casey Carlson

In a time when so much of pop music seems obsessed with viral moments, or as a way to process personal trauma packaged into bite-sized TikTok hits, Don’t Forget Me feels like a refreshing throwback. It’s an album built for the long haul, not for fleeting viral moments. Rogers’ characters might be fictional, but their emotions hit deep. We’ve all watched friends get hitched and felt that twinge of loneliness, and we’ve all had moments where someone didn’t quite see us for who we are. And, let’s be honest—the Knicks probably aren’t winning a championship anytime soon. This is an album meant to live in your car’s CD changer for years, Or even your mom’s car – Tucked right between your mom’s Fleetwood Mac and Joni Mitchell CD’s. Very few albums manage to achieve that delicate balance—classic enough to sit comfortably next to the greats, yet modern enough to feel like it belongs in 2024. If Rogers’ earlier work hinted at her potential, Don’t Forget Me cements it.