Although singer-songwriter Mitski maintains a very low public profile, her music exudes an immediate intimacy and depth of emotion. 

She began her music career in 2012 when she self-released her debut album, Lush. Since then, she has released 6 more albums, each of which demonstrates her capability for capturing struggles and anxieties of identity, love, self-doubt, and heartbreak. 

Mitski underscores a desire for taboo within a lot of us

Her gloomy and melodic voice partnered with lush and rich instrumentals creates an atmosphere in her music that is immersing and intoxicating, an intoxication that is intensified by her lyricism, often indulging in depictions of a perverse and twisted desire for painful or disruptive relationships. Mitski underscores a desire for taboo within a lot of us.

In 2023, the song ‘My Love Mine All Mine’ from her seventh studio album The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We became her first song to reach the Billboard Hot 100 list and garnered a lot of attention on platforms such as TikTok. However, Mitski’s discography is rich, complex, and full of genre-bending instrumentals. She is well worth exploring if you have only just heard of her or have been wanting to get into her. 

I am going to provide an analysis of three of her best albums (in my opinion) to offer a succinct introduction to the current queen of the alternative scene.  

Be the Cowboy 

Be the Cowboy is arguably Mitski’s biggest critical success so far, with Pitchfork, Vulture, and Consequence of Sound naming it their album of the year in 2018.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, she discussed some of her influences for Be the Cowboy being as diverse as Rosamund Pike’s performance in Gone Girl, Alfred Hitchcock, and Cat Stevens. 

The album is a deep dive into the artifice of the performer, loneliness, and heartbreak

The album is a deep dive into the artifice of the performer, loneliness, and heartbreak. It opens with the haunting synth of ‘Geyser’ and the ominous call of ‘You’re my number one / You’re the one I want’ which is interrupted by a sudden distortion of sound. This distortion, combined with the ominous synth, creates a looming sense of troubled love, a major theme of the album. This is built on in the next track ‘Why Didn’t You Stop Me?’ which tells a narrative of longing for a partner you’ve broken up with to have stopped you from doing it. 

The album’s genius lies in its production, skilfully navigating across genres and seamlessly transitioning from pop to electronic, to indie, and disco. 

Her attention to detail in her music indicates her phenomenal ability to capture the physical sensations of love and memory

It ends with the stripped-back ballad ‘Two Slow Dancers’ which paints the picture of a couple who have reunited, dancing from an eerie distance. It begins with the lyrics, ‘Does it smell like a school gymnasium in here / It’s funny how they’re all the same.’ Her attention to detail in her music indicates her phenomenal ability to capture the physical sensations of love and memory. Further emphasised, by the echoey production and haunting synth are paired with strings to create an atmosphere that is at once nostalgic.

Personal favourites: ‘Geyser’, ‘A Pearl’, ‘Pink in the Night’, and ‘Two Slow Dancers’. 

Lush

This pick may be controversial for some fans of Mitski, and indeed Mitski herself has described her college project debut Lush as created by someone who is “long gone now”. The album is evidently a debut, seeming disjointed at points, and a far cry from the experimental instrumentals of her later work, being composed primarily on piano.

However, I argue that it is key reading for a beginner to Mitski. It highlights her predisposition for lyricism and her shining ability to capture an atmosphere in music with ease. 

The album focuses on themes of the body, the relationship between men and women, and the search for a stable sense of self amidst these struggles. The body is the central motif throughout the album, and feelings of instability in one’s own body is exemplified in ‘Brand New City’ where she sings ‘I think my body is falling in pieces.’ 

The stripped-back lo-fi production highlights her voice, which transitions from soft to frantic fluidly

The stripped-back lo-fi production highlights her voice, which transitions from soft to frantic fluidly. In ‘Brand New City’ her voice erupts as she sings ‘If I gave up on being pretty, I wouldn’t know how to be alive.’ Mitski’s honesty brings depth to the dark and gothic aesthetic of the debut. She highlights many problems modern women face, navigating the relationship with societal beauty standards, love and affection, and self-worth and identity.In ‘Abbey’ she laments ‘I was born something / What could I be?’ and she has since proved that she has become a formidable force in the music industry through the lyricism she first displays here. 

Personal favourites: ‘Liquid Smooth’, ‘Abbey’, ‘Brand New City’ and ‘Bag of Bones’.

Puberty 2

Puberty 2, Mitski’s 4th studio album, and my personal favourite, stands out as a tour de force in indie rock with interwoven elements of punk rock saturating it. The themes of depression and Asian American identity come through as the most powerful elements.

Mitski has spoken in an interview with NPR about her positionality as both American and Japanese. She stated, ‘I’m half white, half Asian. And so I don’t really fit into either community very well.’ Her struggle with feeling fully at place is epitomised in ‘Your Best American Girl’ where she laments that the subject of her desire is an ‘All-American Boy’ and her inability to fully connect with him. As the guitar erupts into a cacophony of sound she cries ‘Your mother wouldn’t approve of how my mother raised me’ and ‘I guess I couldn’t help trying to be / Your best American girl.’

Mitski released Puberty 2 in her mid-twenties and the album’s title alludes to the sort of puberty and identity crisis that is common in your early twenties. In ‘Crack Baby’ she cries ‘It’s been a long, hard, twenty-year summer vacation’ alluding to a sense of stagnation and a feeling of not knowing how to start a life in your twenties. 

This yearning for control as she repeats the refrain ‘Tell me no’ in Thursday Girl epitomises a longing for another person to help control your life and to help fight the loneliness, ideas that seep through the album’s run. 

The album ends with the haunting track, ‘A Burning Hill.’

The album ends with the haunting track, ‘A Burning Hill.’ In the song’s final moments, she reflects on finding love and acceptance that is not solely tied to self-worth or an all-consuming relationship. She sings, “And I’ll love the little things, I’ll love some littler things,” acknowledging that amidst the turmoil, there are still quiet moments of beauty.

Personal favourites: ‘Happy’, ‘Your Best American Girl’, ‘I Bet on Losing Horses’ and ‘A Burning Hill’.

Closing Thoughts

Mitski often falls into the common category ascribed to female artists who talk about their feelings candidly of, ‘sad girl music’. And of course, her music is often sad but there is so much more to her music than that. Her voice is a powerful force in the industry, her genre experimentation is exhilarating, and her lyricism is nuanced and clever. 

There is something extremely cathartic about her work and I cannot urge you enough to give her musings a try

I discovered her music as a teenager, but since entering my twenties I have found myself feeling more and more drawn to it. Her lyrics exhibit a powerful literary excellence, and she has an ability to transform intimate moments into a universal feeling. There is something extremely cathartic about her work and I cannot urge you enough to give her musings a try.

Additional tracks worth exploring from her other albums include:

‘Class of 2013’, ‘Goodbye, My Danish Sweetheart’, ‘First Love / Late Spring’, ‘Drunk Walk Home’, ‘Townie’, ‘I Will’, ‘Working for the Knife’, ‘That’s Our Lamp’, ‘Heaven’, and ‘I’m Your Man’

---

Enjoyed this? You might also enjoy…

Live Review: Echo & The Bunnymen

Brit Awards 2024 Round Up

Single Review: Luke Hemmings- Shakes