Mitskisuki Laycock, known as Mitski (“Two Slows Dancers”), has released a new single titled “Working for the Knife” after years of silence following her “Be the Cowboy” album tour, along with a music video for the song.

Mitski’s music fits into the same category as Phoebe Bridgers (“Kyoto”) and Lucy Dacus (“Christine”), as indie rock or folk rock, with a target audience of mildly-to-severely depressed 20 something year olds. Mitski’s new single “Working for the Knife” continues this trend, speaking about the feeling of being burned out from work with no clear end in sight as a 29-year-old. 

Mitski sings in her usual lower, monotonous voice lyrics about being away from the public eye for years and expecting something to change, but the world continues to turn without her. 

Mitski croons “I always knew the world moves on/ I just didn’t know it would go without me/ I start the day high and it ends so low/ ‘Cause I’m working for the knife,” telling about a feeling all too familiar to some. Despite dramatic change in a person’s life, or an attempt at dramatic change like deleting social media or getting a new job, the world just continues as usual. Mitski’s music has always been a fantastic catalyst to put the listener’s own feelings onto, and “Working for the Knife” is no exception. 

Continuing the theme of burn-out from the same grind, Mitski sings “I used to think I’d be done by twenty/ Now at twenty-nine, the road ahead appears the same/ Though maybe at thirty, I’ll see a way to change/ That I’m living for the knife.” Mitski is no longer 29, nor is she 30. Mitski is 31, and has sat on her song since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and the intentional timing of release without changing the ages is essential in understanding the message. The feeling of being burned out has only been accentuated by COVID-19, and the cycle of being down but having to work only to be pushed further down into the spiral of depression is the central part of Mitski’s performance.

The accompanying music video is an important part of the song’s theme, with Mitski silently performing for an empty theatre. As a fun aside, the theatre Mitski filmed the video in is The Egg in Albany, New York. Mitski opens the music video in a black overcoat, blue dress and cowboy hat, a callback to her most recent album “Be the Cowboy.” She dances along the stairs and balconies in the spotlight in expressionist movements to an soundless, irregular beat while the synths of “Working for the Knife” blare, showing how her life as a performer and her actual life are not in sync and are constantly working against each other. At a personal level, she appears to want to evade the spotlight but is forced to work, constantly working against the pain and for the knife, or the public eye. 

It would not be a Mitski song or video if it was not strange, and for the final two minutes of the video it is Mitski alone, with no music, roiling on the empty stage in half-sex, half-interpretive dance movements.

All in all, Mitski has succeeded again in putting out another cryptic depression-fueling banger, just in time for seasonal depression to hit again.

Image from mitski mitski via YouTube