Mitski's previous work casts a looming shadow over the diminished Laurel Hell

Even at her most vulnerable, Mitski has always retained an enigmatic quality. Despite 2018's Be The Cowboy becoming the singer-songwriter’s most successful album yet, she announced in 2019 that she would be taking a hiatus for an unknown period of time: No more music, no more live shows, indefinitely. A clean break between her and all the pressures that come with writing popular music and a life constantly on the road. It’s a choice that guaranteed Mitski some mystique.

As it turns out, the hiatus dovetailed neatly with the pandemic: It took roughly two years to craft what would be her sixth studio album, Laurel Hell, heralded with last year’s single “Working For The Knife.” The time off, and its attendant creative freedom, has resulted in Mitski’s most liberating work. However, it’s also led to her safest album yet—one that feels easily outshined by her previous material.

Laurel Hell opens with the vast desert scenery of “Valentine, Texas,” where the mountains leading to Big Bend National Park loom gorgeously in the distance, but also where gawking tourists tend to congregate outside of the near-empty art installation titled Prada Marfa (which, yes, is actually in Valentine). This feeling of mixed identity makes itself clear in “Valentine, Texas”: A cautious tempo matches the opening lyrics, “Let’s step carefully,” as the record descends into the mind of the artist. The first, lulling verse builds into a swelling, glam-rock instrumental break, with glimmering synths and driving piano lines. The narrator wonders who she’ll be tonight; opening the door to a new self, she hopes the mountains in the distance will help lighten the mental weight she carries.

It’s a solid, even stoic opening song, but it’s hard to not be reminded of another album-opening track of Mitski’s, “Texas Reznikoff” (off of 2014’s Bury Me At Makeout Creek). It’s another emotive song with no chorus, which uses the southern state as a setting of release, with imagery of wide open blue skies and warm summer breezes. Tender and reflective, it soon bursts forth into a thrashing, hollering force—something “Valentine, Texas” almost begs for.

That opener is quickly overtaken by the next track, all about the heaviness and brutality of creating art under capitalism, and the unending desire to achieve what others view as “success.” “Working For The Knife” is intoxicating in sound and lyricism, as the beat falls hard and metal clanks in the background. She handles the complex theme with an apt hand, with lyrics like “I used to think I’d be done at 20, but now at 29 the road ahead appears the same.” At times the synths intentionally grate, adding to the industrial edge.

“Stay Soft” meanders over into ’70s pop territory, reminiscent of groups like ABBA. It’s lively and funky—but despite lyrics about the harshness of the world and how it creates callouses on the softest parts of ourselves, “Stay Soft” feels wrapped in a musical safety blanket. While the monumental Be The Cowboy took elements of pop and rock, twisting and dialing them up to 10, the familiar nature of “Stay Soft” exemplifies the issue with Laurel Hell and its dearth of risk-taking.

Despite coming back after a self-imposed hiatus, it still feels like there’s a thick pane of glass between Mitski and the listener. On previous albums like Puberty 2 and Bury Me At Makeout Creek, you can feel Mitski inviting you into her mind. Much of Laurel Hell comes across like she’s scared to offer up as much emotionally as she did before—wanting to withhold as much as of herself as she can while making her art. It’s a fine intention in theory, but it leaves something to be desired when it feels like an artist is holding back.

“Everyone,” again without a chorus and droning pace, sticks around a little too long. And it finds another companion track from her last record: The line between Be The Cowboy’s “Nobody” and “Everyone” pulls and tugs at the listener, but while “Nobody” unleashes catharsis about feelings of loneliness, “Everyone” fails to grasp at anything. It stays in one place, as if trepidatious about taking things up a notch, either vocally or instrumentally.

“Heat Lightning” takes us out west once more, as thundering drums roll in and Mitski taps into a sense of surrender. It’s the first moment of real release on the album, led by a cascading piano. As she sings, “There’s not much I can do, not much I can change,” things begin to expand, her voice rising as a stinging, lifted synth comes in, sending little zaps of electricity through the song. That frisson of intensity highlights both the possibility and volatility in this new sound, pushing the musician to an elevated place.

It’s followed by a duo of ’80s pop and new wave-inspired offerings. “The Only Heartbreaker” finds Mitski taking on the role of villain—the mess, the ruiner, who not only accepts this analysis, but owns it. “Love Me More,” in contrast, describes a bespoke passion that could fill her up, drowning out all the little voices in her head and leaving only love. While the former can spur dancing, the latter feels like running down a never-ending hallway, reaching for something always a few feet away. Yet, like “Stay Soft,” these two feel safe, with even the grittier moments of “The Only Heartbreaker” lacking a real bite, the kind of straight-to-the-throat feeling so easily found in older songs like “Townie,” “The Pearl,” and “I Bet On Losing Dogs.”

The elements of rock are first heard in “There’s Nothing Left For You,” as cymbals begin to crash and she belts over rumbling drums. It’s an arrangement Mitski has always been fond of: a quiet entry leading to the big build-up. But as it reaches toward something greater, all the tension quickly subsides. Unlike the unleashed hell of Bury Me At Makeout Creek, which followed this structure over and over but never backed down, this track merely peters out. For someone who has historically bared it all in her work, it’s frustrating to hear Mitski craft songs with such surface-level musicality.

Still, on a lyrical level, she conjures wonderful tales of sorrow and desire, with a pointed sense of brevity and a newfound ability to just let things go. After holding onto so much in Be The Cowboy, it seems she’s accepted what she couldn’t change, and now refuses to look back.

Laurel Hell is a definite maturation for Mitski, whose body of work has historically been all about holding fast to pain. This new record argues there can be beauty in letting go and finding the lighter side of life; but only if it doesn’t ring emotionally hollow. The qualities that make Mitski great—her urgency, rawness, and stark ferocity—feel muted here, on an album that seems to cower in fear of making something too bombastically powerful again. True, even when tempered, her roiling under-the-surface drama feels palpable at times. But the hesitancy to let listeners get too close ends up keeping them at arms length.