Mitski (interviewee) (5:09)

So actually, the songwriting started just with where's my phone? Because I was saying it, too. I was saying it over and over, where's my phone? Where's my phone? And I just started humming a melody, and it just became like. I just started singing it to myself. I decided to keep it, record it. Once I found my phone, and I think once I had that snippet, I was like, I wonder what I could do with it. And I think what I wanted to express was the sense of. I tend to disassociate a lot. And this sense of, like, wanting to disassociate, not wanting to be here, everything being overwhelming, and sort of like, going, ah, where's my phone? And, like, everything is too much. And I just want to. I want to, like, leave my brain. I want to go into my phone. I want to just, like, not be here. So that's kind of the general feeling. And I think that's why there's such cacophony in the track. Because I wanted to express how much express the overwhelm that I was trying to get out of and get away from. Right?

Raina Douris (6:26)

I mean, like, the guitars. The first few times I listened to this song, I was like, oh, my speaker's broken. And then I listened to it somewhere else, and I was like, oh, my headphones are also broken.

Mitski (interviewee) (6:34)

That's what we want to do.

Raina Douris (6:35)

But I realized it was on purpose. And those guitars, they show up throughout the album, they are also joined by the orchestra. I know originally, guitars were supposed to be more front and center. What was the original motivation for wanting to strip things down to kind of a rock band sound at the beginning?

Mitski (interviewee) (6:55)

I don't. Maybe it's incorrect to say this. The first word that comes to mind is like. I think I was having a bit of, like, a musical midlife crisis where I was just like, I want to get back to basics. I want to get back to my roots. I want to get back to like, the feeling I had of, like, playing DIY shows, punk shows, and I was just trying to channel that. And I was really. I really wanted it to be this, like, stripped down, just band instrument, just guitar, bass, drums, and voice and showcase the songwriting and have it feel rough. And then we demoed it and the songs said no. The songs were like, we don't care what you want this to be. This is what we actually are.

Raina Douris (7:48)

Well, we're gonna hear the song. Okay. We're gonna perform the song in a lake. But you don't have the orchestra here right now. We could play a bit of that from the album so we can hear the orchestra. I'll play a clip of that right now. Here's in a lake but in a

Mitski (performing artist) (8:02)

lake you can backstroke forever the sky before you and the dark behind. In a big city you can start over the lights all around you the dark safe inside In a big city you can start over.

Raina Douris (8:44)

So that's a bit of In a Lake from your new album, Mitsky. And we can hear the orchestra in there. And so, I mean, what do you think it is about these songs that made it feel right to put them on? When you say they were asking for orchestra?

Mitski (interviewee) (8:59)

I don't want to sound woo woo, but I really do believe that, like, songs all have their own life. And you can try to, like, shoehorn them into what you want them to be, but at a certain point, they just sort of reveal themselves and they tell you how best to make them sound. For example, in a Lake, which we just played, I think it started more as, like, just a guitar song. And the recording also starts just kind of as like a guitar band song. It was very much influenced by being in Nashville. You know, it's a very country music city, pop country. And there's a lot of songs about, like, living in a small town. Small towns are the best. I love my small town. And that's nice for you. But for people who don't fit in, sometimes tiny communities can be really terrible to live in when you're someone who just can't seem to follow the prescribed rules of a community or can't seem to understand why those are the rules. So anyway, all to say, it started out just as more like a. Almost like a Americana, like, folk song with just guitar and some, you know, again, stripped down. But then we thought, well, in a big city, like, what if there's like a soundscape where once the protagonist enters the big city that's being talked about, we hear all the people and the noise and like everything that comes with living in a big city, being surrounded by people, no longer being in your tiny community, you can like be anonymous, but. But in a good way, you know, Especially when you're someone who always stuck out you love. I shouldn't say you. I remember coming to New York and being like, wow, I'm anonymous. And that was amazing. And I think the orchestra, all the various instrumentalists that we got, like, just helps to illustrate that story better. And I think that's kind of what happened with a lot of the songs where it's just like. It just doesn't feel right. It feels like something's missing. It feels like we're not painting the whole picture. And it just ended up needing a full orchestra. What can I say?

Raina Douris (11:22)

Well, now we're gonna hear you without the orchestra performing it live. Also very good. This is in a lake. It's live for World Cafe. This is Mitski.

Mitski (performing artist) (11:36)

I'd never live in a small town of made too many mistakes for where you gotta write your book early or it gets written up in your place where you never get away from your first love it's like one brand of soap sold in town Anyone you can get close to smells like your first time around but in a lake you can backstroke forever the sky before you the dark right behind and in a big city you can start over. And everywhere you go makes your heart ache where you've done enough walks of shame Some days you just go the long way to stay off of memory lane so I'd never live in a small town I'm slow to learn all the rules I've tried very hard to be good but when they think you're bad, people act worse. But in a lake you can let it stroke forever the sky before you and the dark behind you and in a big city you can start over the lights all around you the dark safe inside In a big city you can start over.

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Mitski (interviewee) (15:08)

These days it feels like the news changes every hour. Well, NPR has a podcast that does that too. NPR News now brings you a fresh five minute episode every hour of the day with the latest, most important headlines in episodes that are clear, fact based and easy to digest. Listen to NPR News now on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.

Raina Douris (15:32)

So when I heard that your new album was influenced by Shirley Jackson's novel We have Always Lived in the Castle, I had never read it. I went out, I got it, I read it. Really I did. And I haven't stopped thinking about it since I read it a couple weeks ago. It's, I guess maybe really quickly for people who have not read it. I'm gonna try to like summarize this. It's about two sisters whose family have died in a mysterious poisoning. The villagers think the sisters did it. So they're outcasts. They live in this big house where they're isolated. And it's narrated by the younger sister, Mary Kat. Those are very, very broad strokes here. I'm wondering what was it about this story and that character or those characters that captured your imagination?

Mitski (interviewee) (16:19)

Well, I think and these are all like very much Shirley Jackson themes too. Shirley Jackson is my favorite author. She has a lot of themes about distrust of groups of people. She was the one who wrote the Lottery, which some people, you know, might have read in school. I think she has a lot of characters who are very much in their minds and don't fit in. And if you've read we have Always Lived in the Castle, you might side eye me for saying this, but I really did relate to Mary Kat.

Raina Douris (16:58)

No, but I don't think that's that weird in a way. Like, I think she, there is something relatable about her. She's got this like interior life that is very rich. And you are kind of along for the ride with her, you know.

Mitski (interviewee) (17:14)

Yeah. And she is, she's an outcast. And in the book there's a lot about like ritual. She has these rituals to make sure that things go okay. And it's very like compulsive. She, you know, ritualistically buries something in the yard and that and says a certain string of words. And that means that this won't happen, that that means that our, my family will be ok. And I feel like I relate to that kind of like anxiety and just like being suspicious of groups of outsiders who don't like you and who are trying to encroach on your space and you're just trying to like, protect yourself and your family in your home. And there's a lot of themes that I just like, related to broadly. And I don't know what this says about me, but I think also that

Raina Douris (18:08)

ritual thing, it's like there's lot a. A bit of. I wish I could kind of control these things that are happening.

Mitski (interviewee) (18:13)

Yeah, that's a good point. There's so much about like. And I think this is a theme for me and therefore my music of just like not feeling in control and therefore trying to find control where I can and inevitably failing because so much about life, you just can't. It's out of your control and you just have to go with it. But it's really difficult when you're someone who just like, who needs things to be a certain way, who has anxiety, you know, wants to know what's going to happen.

Raina Douris (18:46)

Yeah. Yes, yes, she does. Mary Cat has one confidante, kind of is her cat, Jonas. And cats appear all over this new album. There's the song Cats, there's that white cat. There's also the visuals for this record which include a white cat with one blue eye and one brown eye. Or like, I think they call those odd eyed cats for you. What does the cat represent? Why did you want to include that?

Mitski (interviewee) (19:13)

I mean, on a very surface level, I just love them. On a deeper level, I think I kind of made cats the mascot of this album because I think cats are very feminized creatures. I think people think of dogs as boys and cats as girls.

Raina Douris (19:40)

Absolutely.

Mitski (interviewee) (19:41)

I don't know where that comes from. But in addition to that, people think of dogs as good and cats as evil. It's very interesting what we're doing here with like, symbolism of dogs and cats. I think the reason why a lot of people love dogs but hate cats or demonize cats is because dogs, dogs can learn obedience. Dogs follow a chain of command. Dogs are pack animals. Dogs have various hierarchies. They do have boundaries, but they don't express them in the same way that cats do. Cats don't know anything about obedience. It's not in their vocabulary. Cats just say, okay, if I do this for you, what's in it for me? You know, like, will I enjoy this if I won't? I'm not gonna do it if I enjoy it. Yeah, let's do it. It's not that they're cold. It's not that they don't like people. It's just that they have boundaries. I know from experience. Cats love you wholeheartedly. Cats like being around people and other cats, sometimes depending on the cat. But they're red. I think people read them like they would read dogs. And then cats ultimately come up short when you try to impose dog law onto cats.

Raina Douris (21:06)

Hey, look, I fell asleep with my cat on my belly last night and she bit me this morning. So, yes, it's like. Yeah.

Mitski (interviewee) (21:12)

And I just. I feel like there's something there to, like cats being feminized, cats being considered to be girls, and also being hated or demonized for not being obedient.

Raina Douris (21:25)

Right.

Mitski (interviewee) (21:26)

There's. I just felt like there was something there and there's thematically something there. For the album, it comes back to

Raina Douris (21:32)

that sort of outside opinions of.

Mitski (interviewee) (21:35)

Yeah. And not being the right kind of quote, unquote woman, you know?

Raina Douris (21:42)

Sure.

Mitski (interviewee) (21:42)

Yeah.

Raina Douris (21:43)

Back to that interior life. The next song that we're gonna hear you play is if I Leave, where the narrator seems to hold a secret that no one knows. There's this imagery of a dark tunnel. And we've been talking about the influence of we have always lived in the castle. This song does seem like it could tie into it, but. But for you, where does this song find the character and the story that you are telling with this album?

Mitski (interviewee) (22:05)

I think it's based in anxiety, the song, broadly. I mean, I hate to be prescriptive about what songs are about because I do want people listening to make their own meaning out of songs. I think that's the best part about music. But with that said, if you are okay with hearing my intention, it's broadly about holding on to somebody so tight because that one person has seemed to have accept you, seem to have supported you and feeling like still being your mentally ill self, still having all the trouble you have and thinking, maybe it's better if I leave this person alone if I go away, but I can't, because then if I do, I lose my person. But also, what am I doing to this person that I'm clinging onto them so tight? Is this really an equal relationship or is this codependent? Like, all of these different thoughts about if I leave this person, what'll happen to me, what'll happen to them? And I think there's a sense of anxiety that permeates the rest of the album too. Of just like, there's something wrong with me. The world knows it and the world tells me there's something wrong with me. And in this song it says, well, there's this one person who seems to accept me. What happens If I lose this person and would it be better if they lost me? So that's kind of broadly what it's about.

Raina Douris (23:52)

It's all underlined by those sort of like the grungy guitars that come back in that are kind of anxiety provoking when you hear them. We're gonna hear you perform it. Before we do, I just want to compliment you on being able to put the word colleagues into a song and make it sound so beautiful. Here's Mitsky performing. If I leave live for World Caf.

Mitski (performing artist) (24:22)

If I leave somebody else will love you but nobody else could forgive me Quite as often as you. No one on this street knows no one in this mall knows no one in this bar knows and none of my friends know Surely none of my colleagues More to my family. If I leave somebody else will find you but nobody else could see me crying as clearly as you, you, You. Only you know I've let only you know How I ride through a tunnel and it's dark the whole way I ride through a tunnel it's been the whole way I ride through a tunnel it's still dark the whole way I. Could I lose you? I couldn't lose you. For if I lost it Somebody else will cheer you but who else could love me Quite as kindly as you? Who could love me quite as kindly as you? You.

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Raina Douris (27:27)

on this album and in the book that we were talking about, you know, involves isolation, having a secret, safe world, the outside world seeing you differently. And it has me wondering, you know, everyone has their personal self and their public self, but as a person in the public eye, the space between those two selves might feel a little bit bigger, maybe a little bit more fragmented. How much energy does it take to cultivate the public self and keep it separate?

Mitski (interviewee) (27:56)

Wow, what a question. It takes a lot of energy. I don't. I'm introverted, so it's kind of just like who you are when you go to a party, but times 1000. Like who you make yourself to be around other people, but the other people are the entire world. So that's kind of how it feels. And the thing is, I don't think I am like being somebody else in public. But again, it goes back to the who you are at a party kind of situation where it's just like you are still yourself, you're not pretending to be somebody else, but you're kind of heightening certain aspects of yourself so that they can navigate being among all these different people. And then you go home and you take all your clothes off and unwind and stare at a wall for a while.

Raina Douris (28:59)

So, yeah, recently I talked to Florence Welch of Florence the Machine, who you worked on on her latest album. And she talks about that feeling of being devoured as a woman and as a performer and especially when she was younger. And I thought back to that conversation as soon as I heard your song Dead Women on this album. I want to play a clip of that song. Is there any insight you could give us into writing it?

Mitski (interviewee) (29:25)

I wrote it in anger. I know it doesn't sound like an angry song, but there's a sort of resigned anger, I think. And again, you can take whatever you want from this song. But when I was writing it, it just felt like the world was telling me the only good woman is a dead one. We want you dead. We want you dead on the inside. We don't want you to be a whole person. We want you to be a baby making servant. You have no other purpose. You can't have dreams. You can't have volition of your own. You exist to serve. And if you have an inner life, well, don't. Don't have it be dead inside. And that's what people. That's what the world seems to want of women. And I was also reflecting on like the glee with which people consume. It's dark, but like true crime, the glee with which people consume dead women, the fetishization of dead women. And I was thinking about especially public figures like Marilyn Monroe, or going back to even like Sylvia Plath, for example. When I learned that Sylvia Plath's. After she died, her husband, who was abusive, was in charge of compiling all her poems for a certain collection, a posthumous collection. And he decided to take out all the poems that are about how he's terrible and just include the parts that make her sound crazy and put it in a compilation. I forgot the name of the book, but when I learned that and then I looked more into like their relationship and I don't know, I don't know how it connects, but it feels like it all connects where it's just like, my God, like you don't want women to be full, complex human beings. You don't want us to be, to have inner lives. You don't want us to be. You just want us to be dead women serving you. You just Want to take cherry, pick the poems that we have that you like, put it in a compilation, and go see how pleasing she was. Yeah, it just. It's a lot. It's a lot of things I tried to put in this one song.

Raina Douris (31:58)

Yeah. Once they're dead, you can control their image.

Mitski (interviewee) (32:00)

Exactly. Exactly. And you get to, like. I don't know if he's still interned there. The man who asked to be buried on top of Marilyn Monroe.

Raina Douris (32:14)

I didn't know.

Mitski (interviewee) (32:15)

Do you know about that? So she's in. I forgot what they're called.

Raina Douris (32:17)

Like a mausoleum.

Mitski (interviewee) (32:18)

A mausoleum. Yeah, I think it's a mausoleum. I don't know the term for it, but they're, like, you know, stacked up. And he asked to be buried on top of her and facing down.

Raina Douris (32:32)

Ew.

Mitski (interviewee) (32:32)

And so that even in her death, she cannot get away from a man being on top of her against her will. It's just. And those stories over and over and over and over again, just complete. Keep reinforcing that. Like, okay, you don't want us to be people. You just want us to be fembots that serve you.

Raina Douris (32:56)

I'm gonna play some of the song. It's called Dead Women. This is Miski on World Cafe.

Mitski (performing artist) (33:01)

Would you have liked me better if I'd died So you could tell my story the way it ought to be? You'd find my parents and ask to see my. My things R. Through it all fill the blanks with what you need.

Raina Douris (33:47)

That was a bit of Dead Women from Mitzky's latest album, Nothing's about to Happen to Me on World Cafe, your live show, when I saw you touring your last album. The LAN is inhospitable, and so are we. Very meticulously planned. It was very choreographed. It was beautiful. I saw it at a venue in Philly called the Met. It's a big theater. On this tour, you're playing some different kinds of venues, including Hollywood High School in la, which is a literal high school. What were you looking for as far as venues for this tour?

Mitski (interviewee) (34:15)

Well, it goes back to my very first intentions for this album. Even though we ended up adding a whole bunch of orchestra and other instruments, at its core, the intention was I want to get back to the feeling that I had 10 years ago or earlier, 15 years ago, where I felt like I was in a room with a few people and we were really connecting. And it felt more raw and it felt more, you know, right down to basics, both in terms of performance and gear and everything, but also, like, the basics of human interaction. Just like being in the room with someone connecting. And I was trying to recreate that feeling using the various places we're performing where I wanted it to feel special, I wanted it to feel like an experience. I wanted to recreate even the feeling that I had going to shows, going to DIY shows, punk shows where I was like this. I feel like I'm getting something. I feel like I'm experiencing something really important for myself. I think I'm experiencing something that is not like anything else. And I'm going to remember, you know, like going to an abandoned firehouse and like watching a band, you know, and I kind of, you know, obviously the scale is different, but I wanted to recreate that feeling of like, I feel like I'm having an experience.

Raina Douris (35:47)

Well, I am curious about that because I don't want you to give anything away. But what are the logistics, like when you're trying to do something at this scale but in a place like a high school?

Mitski (interviewee) (35:57)

I think you should ask my managers that because it seemed terrible. I feel really bad actually. God bless them.

Raina Douris (36:05)

Okay, I'll ask them when we're done here. The last song that we're going to hear your perform is called I'll Change for your. It has a line. I really love bars. Such magic places. You can be with other people without having anyone at all. I think there are some people out there who might think, oh, it's sad to go drown your sorrows at a bar. But I also think there's kind of a deliciousness to wallowing. Could you tell us why you wrote this song?

Mitski (interviewee) (36:31)

Thank you for saying that there is a deliciousness to wallowing.

Raina Douris (36:35)

There really is.

Mitski (interviewee) (36:36)

And I mean, that's kind of why I wrote the song. Because listen, we have songs that encourage you when you're down, you know, pick yourself up, it's going to be okay. And those songs really serve an important purpose. But I feel like when I'm really self pitying and I'm feeling down, what I want is a song that goes, poor me, you know, poor me. How terrible is this? I'm having a terrible time. I'm heartbroken. Like in those moments, I feel like there should be songs for being pitiful and pathetic because those are real things that people experience and that's okay. And it's not like you're gonna be there forever, but when you're in that, why not like fully experience it? So that's kind of. I was writing for, if nothing else myself in those moments.

Raina Douris (37:39)

Yeah, I also think there's something kind of refreshing about hearing a woman sing about that. Because. And this is kind of a through line through this conversation, but the expectations are different. A man wallowing and drinking away his sorrows at a bar is sort of romanticized. And if you're sad as a lady, you go home, you eat your pint of ice cream in front of the tv, you watch a rom com, and you cry. And I don't think that's necessarily true for everybody.

Mitski (interviewee) (38:04)

Yeah. Which, by the way, speaking of rom coms, I remember even being a kid watching rom coms from, like, the early 2000s, and there was this, like, you have to. I was like, you really have to pick yourself up real fast. Cause, like, they would. The woman would get broken up with, and a week later her best friend characters would be like, you gotta get back out there. Date another guy. And it's just like, it's only been a week. My God, let her just be sad for a little bit. Let her recover. And it was just like, I feel like there was that kind of mentality in the early 2000s and the 90s of just like, you don't get to be sad. It's pathetic to be sad. Go out there and have sex.

Raina Douris (38:46)

Yeah. Stop being dead weight.

Mitski (interviewee) (38:47)

Yeah, exactly.

Raina Douris (38:48)

Sitting around. It might be a song about feeling pathetic or being pathetic, but the actual music doesn't sound like, quote unquote, sad. Right. Could you tell us about the contrast that you created here using kind of a bossa nova beat?

Mitski (interviewee) (39:02)

Well, it goes back to, like, the just luxuriating and wallowing. I wanted to create this atmosphere of, like, you're wallowing, but you're in a bar. And maybe it's a nice bar. And I wanted it to sound like music that would be playing while you're wallowing and you're kind of swaying and you're like, you know, this sadness feels really nice, you know, and being among people and just kind of like weirdly enjoying your depression in a night. Nice place. And so that kind of like, woozy, nice feeling I wanted to add to the song.

Raina Douris (39:38)

If you're listening, whether you're sad or not, you can wallow in it right now. This is Mitski with I'll Change for your perform live for World Cafe.

Mitski (performing artist) (39:58)

Do I let our love die when you're the only other keeper of my most precious memories yeah, I've been drinking. Why is that? Gotta mean I can't call you about you and me. For you, you to love me again if you. Don't like me now I will change for you. Bars such magic places you can be with other people without having anyone at all. But now they say they're closing so I'm loitering outside Watching all the cars passing by Like a kid waiting for my ride. For you to love me again if you don't like me now I will change for you Change for you.

Raina Douris (42:55)

Live for World Cafe. Mitski. I'll change for you. It's a song from her new album, Nothing's about to Happen to Me. Mitski is my guest today. It's been so much fun talking to you. Thank you so much for being on the show.

Mitski (interviewee) (43:06)

Thank you for having me.

Raina Douris (43:07)

It was so much fun.

Mitski (interviewee) (43:07)

I loved it. Thank you.

Raina Douris (43:09)

Thank you.