Mitski’s “Nothing’s About To Happen to Me” Shows Us That Not Everything Changes

Rune Puha, Staff Reporter

March 18, 2026

Mitski eighth studio album, “Nothing’s About to Happen to Me,” was released on Friday, Feb. 27.

Mitski hits the ground running in 2026 with her eighth studio album, “Nothing’s About to Happen to Me,” which features songs soaked in darkness and narrative-driven storytelling.

Released on Friday, Feb. 27, the orchestral elements and undeniably eerie intimacy that Mitski crafted with this album force listeners to turn inwards as she explores themes of isolation, romantic abjection, and memory.

Mitski allows her music to be the mirror that listeners gaze at to hopefully make sense of the complexity that is the human condition.

“Nothing’s About to Happen to Me” Tracklist

“In a Lake”

In my opinion, this song could be considered a 5/10. It was a rather mediocre way to start a brand-new album.

With Americana and folk influences, the lyrics are underlaid with acoustic instrumentation.

“In a Lake” explores the struggle of living in a small town, where rumors get around quickly and what happens to you becomes who you are — your narrative easily getting written for you. But in a big city, it’s like a lake. You’re just another drop in the bucket. You get to decide and create who you are.

This track is all about self-representation, image, and finding solace in being unknown. Similarly to the creature in “Frankenstein,” it can be hard to connect when everyone has already decided who and what you are.

“Where’s My Phone?”

Released on Friday, Jan. 16, “Where’s My Phone?” was the leading single alongside the album announcement.

“Where’s My Phone?” is an excellent track to follow “In a Lake,” covering the idea of no longer relying on others to save you, and that often you will only have yourself.

This track addresses the modern anxiety that comes from daily life and other’s perceptions of you.

The louder ending with the staticky alternative sounds, paired with the repetition of the narrator wanting her head to be like clear glass, reminds me of my own personal struggles with dissociation and the desperate desire to escape oneself.

“Cats”

As one of my personal favorites in the album, I found this track incredibly relatable. It encapsulates well the codependency that often exists in relationships and how deeply painful it can be when you love someone so much, but the other person is already halfway out the door.

It reminds me of an experience where you can see this whole future, and it hurts to realize that all your partner saw was the end.

But there’s also a sort of quiet comfort found in this ending, because even with all the love, you felt the drain of this relationship — of constantly pouring more and more into something that never gave anything back.

“Cats” is an amazing song that portrays that experience truthfully, even the more intimate pains that are often hard to talk about.

“If I Leave”

Released as a single on Friday, Feb. 27, the day of the album's release, “If I Leave” is the hard truth that listeners need to hear.

I adore this song.

“If I Leave” encapsulates the fear and struggle of knowing that you should leave a relationship for your own health when that same relationship has also made you incredibly happy. Like the narrator, you believe that only your partner truly understands you. And that without them, who could ever love you again?

The prospect of leaving a strained or potentially toxic relationship is terrifying, especially when your mind plagues you with what ifs — could it get better? What if it does? This track explores fear of abandonment, codependency, and the desperate attachment to a partner who acts as the sole, intimate witness to one’s struggles, whether it be from mental health or otherwise.

“Dead Women”

“Dead Woman” is an anthem of feminine rage.

This song functions as a critique of how women have been denied agency, dehumanized, and given no control over their own narratives in our society. The lyrics grab your attention, with verses like, “Would you have liked me better if I had died / So you could tell my story the way it ought to be?”

This song also tackles the objectification and sexualization that women face even after their deaths through lines like, “‘Cause you’re hosting the viewing / Saying, ‘she gave her life so we could have her in our dreams.’”

Even in modern society, women and girls are still highly objectified and sexualized — not only them, but young boys as well. These atrocities even happen within families, though society doesn’t want to face that nasty truth, because it is what it is: disgusting.

Mitski isn’t afraid to bring the dark to the light.

“Instead of Here”

Like many of Mitski’s other songs in this album, “Instead of Here” represents isolation and disassociation. But it also expresses one of humankind’s darkest longings: the seduction and quiet pull in the idea of death or disappearing completely.

It’s a downward spiral that is all too easy to get stuck in — the cycle of self-harm and suicidal ideation that seems to be expressed through lyrics like, “I got up when it was done” and “Opening my box / Of old friend misery, my secret treat / To feel like myself again.”

Death is not romanticized as a reaper in “Instead of Here,” but rather as a patient acquaintance who wishes the narrator knew they were just a kid — but would still come back every time the narrator called her, in case that time was really the end.

Mitski warns of the comfort you can find in that darkest mindset — when all that seems to reach you is pain, even if you seem better. It’s a cycle.

“I’ll Change for You”

Released as a stand-alone single on Tuesday, Feb. 3, “I’ll Change For You” is a wake-up call for those who need to hear it.

With a jazzy air, “I’ll Change for You” fully leans into the meaning of romantic abjection. This song represents the stage that often occurs before a relationship dies where a lover is bargaining — willing to do anything to keep the relationship, including changing themself.

Through lyrics like “How do I let our love die / When you’re the only keeper / Of my most precious memories?” this song explores the themes we’ve already seen — and the desperate need to beg for love from somebody who has already left.

“I’ll Change for You” shows us how desperate change never saves a relationship — it just ruins you.

“Rules”

Simply put, this song captures the stages of a breakup: the initial innocence before it happens, the following heartbreak, the loneliness and crying, the change — like as we saw through “I’ll Change for You” — and then waking up again only to discover that, while everything is the same, they are gone, but life goes on.

“Rules” is the step after “I’ll Change for You,” and the order couldn’t be better.

“That White Cat”

This song feels like a fever dream to me, but not in a bad way.

“That White Cat” is an unnerving ballad on the loss of bodily autonomy through a metaphor of a cat marking a house.

But, is it your house?

Or is it the cat’s house?

“Charon’s Obol”

Even before listening to “Charon’s Obol,” I had a preference for it just by name, where I recognized the Greek mythological inspirations, but was left wondering if the song would live up to my hopes.

Mitski didn’t disappoint.

The song is soaked in memory. The narrator is a token coin — the payment for those who died in the house, the girls whom she outlived. This song explores themes of female isolation, traumatic memory, and the self-sacrificial role of caretakers in a haunting, patriarchal world.

The narrator is the caretaker for the hounds of the dead girl’s memories, who represent a cycle of abuse that the narrator escaped yet is forced to dwell upon in order to prevent it from happening again. In order to stop it, she has to be the coin to the dead. Drawing from the ancient Greek tradition of placing a coin in the mouth of the dead to pay Charon, the narrator is the obol — “Charon’s Obol.”

“Lightning”

This song doesn’t interest me too much.

“Lightning” accepts the inevitability of death as more than tragedy. What I took away is that trying to prevent death is like trying to stop the rain — which gets tiring. It’s better to live life to its fullest, dance in the rain, and accept when lightning strikes. Afterall, lightning can be beautiful.

Mitski closes the album not with resolution, but with what feels like a suspended breath, leaving listeners caught between hope and detachment. It’s a reminder that sometimes hurt and change are a part of life — even the hesitance that comes before — because in that uncertainty, there’s something deeply human waiting to be heard: the voice that exists within all of us.

Overall, “Nothing’s Going to Happen to Me” is an intimate album that deserves a listen.

About the Contributor

Rune Puha, Staff Reporter

Sophomore Rune Puha has always lived in Oregon, starting first from Eugene, before drifting up into Portland at eight, where they’ve grown to quite enjoy the rainy weather. Since starting La Salle, Rune’s favorite classes include Choir, World History 1, and French, because they love learning facts, and data about past events which can be cross referenced into story ideas. Rune participates in the Morning Choir, and also started the Creative Writing Club at La Salle. Outside of La Salle, they dabble in violin playing, which they did all throughout middle school, and they write stories creatively. On the weekends, they’ll spend most of their time collecting facts they need for their stories, reading and annotating books, and staying up late to actually draft story ideas and character information sheets. For vacation, Rune has traveled to California, Texas, and Utah. After La Salle, Rune hopes to apply for University of Cincinnati and similar schools with well developed programs in Creative Writing, in order to obtain a Ph.D in Creative Writing, and live somewhere out of state.

The La Salle Falconer

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Mitski’s “Nothing’s About To Happen to Me” Shows Us That Not Everything Changes

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