Album number 8 from the mercurial American-Japanese mega-talent.
Mitski is not your average megastar. She was deeply uncomfortable with the level of fame she hit a few albums back and nearly walked away from music altogether. She dislikes being a consumerist item, she hates the transactional nature of music consumption. She seems to have found some level of peace with it all, but she always does things on her terms. Most recently she has been helping produce tracks for a range of artists including on the most recent Florence and the Machine album. When she comes to tour the new album in May in the UK she will be doing some much smaller venues, in among trips to the likes of the Royal Albert Hall, and it seems unthinkable for most American artists with 23 million monthly listeners on Spotify alone to do that kind of thing. Connection is often more important to her than profit.
The new album is a delight, a really mature piece of song writing mixed in with some wry humour. The two initial singles really set the tone. ‘Where’s My Phone?’ has Mitski at her most playful, a relatable conundrum for all engaged in modern life and beeping out her own solitary swear word. ‘I’ll Change For You’ was high drama theatre. The whole thing is written as if taking place in a high class hotel bar and lobby. The protagonist insists she can change, unwilling to let an important relationship end:
“How do I let our love die
When you’re the only other keeper
Of my most precious memories?
Yeah, I’ve been drinking
Why’s that gotta mean
I can’t call you ’bout you and me?”
There is a sad desperation about it all, but a desperation born out of the clear ending of something very special. People don’t really ever change that much, the relationship is sunk, but it doesn’t stop that need, that want to stay front and centre. A number of other tracks carry on the themes of this one, ‘Cats’ and ‘If I Leave’ feel like a further continuation. “If I leave somebody else will find you But nobody else could see me.”
The rest of the album is very strong. ‘Dead Women’ has a quiet power to it: “Would you have liked me better if I’d died So you could tell my story the way it ought to be?”
As you would expect from a Mitski album there is a mix of gentle, country tinged, steel guitar twanging tracks and full blown indie eccentricity and scuzz. The lyrics are a joy to get stuck into, nobody makes them quite like Mitski.
Essential Tracks: ‘If I Leave,’ ‘Dead Women,’ ‘I’ll Change For You’ and ‘That White Cat.’
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