Mitski returns with Be The Cowboy, out 17 August via Dead Oceans, the follow up to 2016’s brilliant Puberty 2,
The outstanding lead single ‘Geyser’ captures a moment of intense catharsis, haunting vocals and undulating instrumentals explode with release, it comes with an accompanying video directed by Zia Anger. The imagery conjures up echoes of Björk, and Madonna‘s ‘Frozen‘ yet portrays a unique interpretive expression of a character grasping for a sense of control over her life. A woman who can’t hold it all in any more. She’s about to burst and unleash a torrent of desire and passion that has been building up inside.
“For this new record, I experimented in narrative and fiction,” comments Mitski. Though she hesitates to go so far as to say she created full-on characters, she reveals she had in mind “a very controlled icy repressed woman who is starting to unravel. Because women have so little power and showing emotion is seen as weakness, this ‘character’ clings to any amount of control she can get. Still, there is something very primordial in her that is trying to find a way to get out.”
In Be The Cowboy, Mitski delves into the loneliness of being someone, how it can feel so much like being no one. While recording the album with her long-time producer Patrick Hyland, the pair kept returning to “the image of someone alone on a stage, singing solo with a single spotlight trained on them in an otherwise dark room. For most of the tracks, we didn’t layer the vocals with doubles or harmonies, to achieve that ‘person singing alone on stage’ atmosphere.”
Pre-order Be The Cowboy here.
UK tour dates:
19 Sep – Manchester @ Gorilla
20 Sep – Glasgow @ Saint Luke’s
22 Sep – Dublin @ Tivoli Theatre
24 Sep – Leeds @ Brudnell Social Club
25 Sep – Bristol @ Trinity Arts Centre
26 Sep – London @ O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire
