{"product_id":"mitski-the-land-is-inhospitable-and-so-are-we","title":"Mitski – The Land Is Inhospitable And So Are We","description":"\u003cp\u003eAfter contemplating retirement, Mitski returns with a new album that’s warmer, quieter, and more organic-sounding. For the first time in a while, she sounds like she has space to breathe.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAs always with Mitski’s albums, loneliness is an inescapable feature of the geography: “It’s just witness-less me,” she sings to empty space on “The Frost,” realizing that she’s alone in her grief. Her steely, vigilant stance—so prevalent on 2018’s Be the Cowboy and Laurel Hell—has softened, the starch dissolving from her personality. So even when connection seems impossible, she reaches for company. She sends love to a benevolent moon, hoping it will pass on the sentiment after she fades to dust. She pours herself another glass, because “sometimes a drink feels like family”—and over solitary, minimal guitar strums, a chorus of voices swell up behind her like a cruel hallucination: “FAMILY.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThese are among some of the most surreal, existential, and fascinating songs of Mitski’s career, zooming out from the exigencies of her vocation to probe the essence of the human condition and our place in the cosmos. The album still offers portraits of routine suffering, like on “I Don’t Like My Mind,” on which Mitski plays a self-loathing workaholic who only rests on “an inconvenient Christmas,” gorging herself on cake only to vomit it back up. But the broader universe seeps into even the most mundane settings, intimate moments charged with otherworldly significance. “Heaven” is a tableaux of domestic bliss in which Mitski becomes one with the environment, comparing herself to murmuring brooks and bending willows as she luxuriates in private moments with her lover: “I sip on the rest of the coffee you left\/A kiss left of you\/Heaven, heaven, heaven.” The misty orchestral swirls at the song’s end make it feel like we too have ascended. — (via \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/pitchfork.com\/reviews\/albums\/mitski-the-land-is-inhospitable-and-so-are-we\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"\u003ePitchfork\u003c\/a\u003e)\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003ciframe width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/vx4kLgnFexo?si=oA8b0e-k3IIkhM0h\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e—\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMitski’s voice is usually tender and intimate, but has another mode, one suggestive of a woman raising her eyes skyward as she sings. She deploys it during I’m Your Man, leavening a song about the insidious destructive power of patriarchy: it’s leavened further by its conclusion, which features airy, wordless backing vocals and snarling dogs, like the Swingle Singers being savaged to death.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003ePerhaps it is intended to diffuse some of the intense seriousness with which fans greet her work. Either way, Lee Hazlewood feels like an apposite comparison and not merely because of the album’s sound: \u003cem\u003eThe Land Is Inhospitable\u003c\/em\u003e shares his ability to slip between the heartfelt and the sardonic without ever losing its grip on the listener. It ends with the singer alone on I Love Me After You – rather than heartbroken, she is celebrating her freedom by walking around the house naked (“don’t even care that the curtains are open”) – which feels about right. There are an awful lot of singer-songwriters around exploring the kind of subjects Mitski touches on here: disillusionment, isolation, broken relationships, overindulgence. But it is questionable whether anyone else is doing it with this much skill, this lightness of touch or indeed, straightforward melodic power: in the best possible sense, Mitski feels out on her own. — (via \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/music\/2023\/sep\/14\/mitski-the-land-is-inhospitable-and-so-are-we-review-a-songwriter-with-stunning-melodic-power\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/a\u003e)\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003ciframe width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" style=\"border-radius:12px\" data-testid=\"embed-iframe\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/album\/2Cn1d2KgbkAqbZCJ1RzdkA?utm_source=generator\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\"\u003e\u003c\/iframe\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e↓\u003cbr\u003eLabel: Dead Oceans\u003cbr\u003eFormat: Vinyl, LP, Album, Gatefold\u003cbr\u003eReleased: 2026\u003cbr\u003eGenre: Pop\u003cbr\u003eStyle: Indie Pop\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFile under: Alternative \/ Indie \/ Pop\u003cbr\u003e⦿\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Dead Oceans","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46813830840478,"sku":"656605165011","price":60.0,"currency_code":"SGD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0584\/5434\/3838\/files\/mitski-TheLandIsInhospitableAndSoAreWe.jpg?v=1778319308","url":"https:\/\/theanalogvault.com\/products\/mitski-the-land-is-inhospitable-and-so-are-we","provider":"The Analog Vault","version":"1.0","type":"link"}