Mitski is More Than TikTok
By Lindsay Zoladz / Photographs by Arielle Bobb-Willis At the end of the summer of 2019, the indie musician Mitski was on top of the world, and she was exhausted. Mitski (whose last name is Miyawaki, though she doesn’t use it professionally) was wrapping up a long, triumphant tour for her acclaimed 2018 album, “Be the Cowboy.” The music website Pitchfork had named it Album of the Year; NPR proclaimed Mitski “the 21st century’s poet laureate of young adulthood”; Iggy Pop, on his BBC radio show, called her “the most advanced American songwriter that I know.” She was about to turn 29 and had finally reached the perch of success and stability that she had been working toward for years, but she also felt disillusioned. Everyone wanted a piece of her. Ninety percent of her time was spent on administrative tasks and promotional duties instead of writing and performing, the part of the job she truly loved. She hadn’t been home in years; she wasn’t even sure where or what home was anymore.
So that June, on her charmingly candid personal Twitter account, @mitskileaks, she announced that an upcoming date headlining Central Park’s SummerStage would be her “last show indefinitely.” Fans protested so vociferously that she issued a clarification: “Y’all, I’m not quitting music!” she tweeted to her 130,000 followers. “I’ve been on non-stop tour for over 5 years, I haven’t had a place to live during this time, & I sense that if I don’t step away soon, my self-worth/identity will start depending too much on staying in the game, in the constant churn.” The next week, she performed the ultimate digital mic drop: She deleted her account.