Mitski made her bold return last month, presenting ‘Working for the Knife’. Today, Mitski announces Laurel Hell, her new album, out February 4th on Dead Oceans, and unveils a new single/video, ‘The Only Heartbreaker.’
New single ‘The Only Heartbreaker,’ co-written with Dan Wilson, and the first such song in her discography, pairs soaring pop swells with deceptively straightforward lyrics whose sincere refrain turns ironic as it depicts “the person always messing up in the relationship, the designated Bad Guy who gets the blame. It could simply be about that, but I also wanted to depict something sadder beneath the surface, that maybe the reason you’re always the one making mistakes is because you’re the only one trying.” Mitski sings: “So I’ll be the loser in this game // I’ll be the bad guy in the play // I’ll be the water main that’s burst inflames // You’ll be by the window only watching.”
Mitski wrote many of these songs during or before 2018, and the album was finished being mixed in May 2021. It is the longest span of time Mitski has ever spent on a record, and a process that concluded amid a radically changed world. She recorded Laurel Hell with her longtime producer Patrick Hyland throughout the isolation of a global pandemic, during which some of the songs “slowly took on new forms and meanings, like seed to flower.” The album as a whole evolved “to be more uptempo and dance-y. I needed to create something that was also a pep talk.” Mitski explains. The tension that emerges between her refined but plaintive lyrics and the effervescent 1980s sound is a desperately needed infusion, and the work of a mature artist: an album that delivers nuanced profundity on a current of contagious dance beats. It is irresistible.
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