The first time I heard Mitski
I was folding laundry. It’s odd
that I remember that, but I do.
While I was folding, I decided to stream
something brand new, something
I had never heard before. It’s
likely that Mitski showed up in
a curated list of “things you might
like,” or, “if you like this, certainly
you will like this.” I listened to
the Puberty 2 album, at that time,
her fourth album, and the first
one, apparently, to get traction.
She was showing up on people’s
lists of hot-new-best-of-so-far artists,
so when Be The Cowboy
came out, having only listened
to the previous album once or
twice, I was intrigued enough
to grab that CD, which today, is
one of my favorite albums of
the last decade. So every album
that came after, I found on vinyl.
I love her. She’s spooky, moody,
funny sometimes, ironic,
shockingly honest, dark, and smart.
Sometimes she’s backed by a full-on
rock band, sometimes she’s doing
a kind of 80’s throwback synth-pop
thing, sometimes she’s almost
country or jazzy or orchestral,
sometimes disco, lounge, choral,
and other times ethereal and
minimalist, or experimental and
cacophonous. Stylistically, she’s
pretty unpredictable, but there’s
always great singing,
always lovely melodies,
and always intriguing lyrics.
Of the three albums on vinyl
of hers I have, I think my favorite is
the most recent, the 2026
Nothing’s Going To Happen To Me,
the cover of which features a chill
but strange looking domesticated
cat, who unwittingly is about to be
attacked by a fierce looking tabby,
or leopard, or tiger–at any rate–
another cat. That art is a nice
little metaphor for what Mitski
does on her records, mostly capturing
the irony of life and love, the
paradoxical nature of living, the way
in which we all, like our cats, fool
ourselves about our realities.
This record contains the rocker
“Where’s My Phone?” where finding
the device she’s misplaced becomes
a kind of existential crisis.
I think what I like most about this
record is what I love about Be The
Cowboy, that the tunes rock a little
harder, or at least, represent more
conventional writing and production,
are more toe-tapping, head-banging,
are just more fun. Therein lies the most
intriguing paradox of Mitski’s music:
it’s mostly about suffering, but joyfully.
Joyful suffering.
Notes on the vinyl editions:
- Laurel Hell, Dead Oceans Records, 2022, red vinyl.
- The Land is Inhospitable and So Are We, Dead Oceans Records, 2023, baby blue vinyl.
- Nothing’s About To Happen To Me, Dead Oceans Records, 2026, yellow vinyl.
In case you don’t already know: I’m listening to almost everything in my vinyl collection, A to Z, and writing at least one, sometimes two or three long skinny poem-like-things in response for each artist, and on a few occasions, writing a long skinny poem-like-thing in response to more than one artist. As a poet and a student of poetry, I understand that these things look like poems, but they don’t really sound much like poetry, hence, I call them “poem-like-things.” I’ll admit that they’re just long, skinny essays that veer every now and then into the poetic or lyric.
michael jarmer 