She has many songs that resonate with the queer community, such as ‘Real Men', 'Once More to See You', ‘Come Into the Water’, ‘Cop Car’, Etc etc. She also once made a Twitter post saying, 'I'm a Libra, so my sexuality is essentially "you can really be any gender as long as you treat me like a princess."' Which well, means she’s probably queer. Regardless, many of her songs provide comfort and connection to the queer community. I'm almost certain that 'Once More to See You' is specifically about being closeted (along with ‘A Loving Feeling’)
Obviously it's not the intended meaning but as a queer person, 'strawberry blond' also resonates with the experience of falling for a straight person of your same gender, knowing they won't reciprocate your feelings.
I think as long as we acknowledge the original meaning and respect it, everyone is allowed to have their own interpretations as art is by nature interpretive
No I know, I’m just saying that the song resonates with a lot of queer people like myself. It’s not about being lgbt but it can definitely apply to transgender people, gay men, etc, more than some of her other songs do.
indie artist which automatically adds lgbt fans due to the genre + popular on tiktok for edits of fandoms, fandoms are predominately queer
and in terms of lgbt representation, definitely not explicitly, but lots of the songs are about unrequited love which is common for lgbt people in adolescence to fall in love with a straight friend
So there’s a phenomenon in media where queer angst resides in music that’s in parallel to experiences actual queer people go through even though it’s not intended for queer people to listen to intrinsically..
, in her music she gives the idea of being ostracized in her relationships and going though loneliness in similar fashion gay men and women go through even though she is a straight woman , her early work is raw , bitter , angry and overall non conforming to music that’s about love in typical and superficial ways. Queerness goes a bit deeper especially because she’s a woman.
She in her early songs plays the guitar very messy , very loud , almost like she’s drunk and angry and she’s not trying to be pretty she’s just sensitive and upset , queerness is treated as excommunication and as a threat to a status quo , she challenges it by how she carries her ideas. Idk what her sexually is but it doesn’t matter
“Even though she is straight”
Idk if I agree with this, I have no interest in speculating about someone’s sexuality but though she’s never labelled her sexuality publicly it’s repeatedly been made very clear that although she’s attracted to men, she’s not straight. She has chosen not to label herself explicitly publicly, but personally I think the reasonable solution to this is not to speculate by assuming she therefore must be straight. Especially when she’s said things outside her music that directly contradict this.
I feel like we culturally tend to straight-wash queer women and make the assumption that if they’ve ever mentioned a man romantically/sexually, they MUST be het. I agree with what you’re saying, and think it’s a really good analysis but I’m not sure it all applies to Mitski, who is a) pretty happy to strongly hint she’s queer and b) very aware that many/most of her listeners are also. But I totally agree with your discussion of how queerness presents in her music and think it’s super well written.
Sort of reminds me of Billie eilish. Everyone made a huge deal when she came out but I just remember being like….did we not know that?
She isn’t. In Cop Car she says “I’ve loved many boys, I’ve loved many girls” and in one tweet she said smth like “I’m a libra, which means ‘you can be any gender as long as you treat me like a princess’”
No worries I just wanted to add the other perspective because the post seemed confused that she’s got a fan base in a community that she’s definitely a part of. Like I said, I agree with your points and I think you nailed it whether from the assumption she’s straight or not. But I do think it’s a weird thing culturally rn that a woman can be pretty explicitly queer but without a super specific label we fall back on the assumption she MUST be straight.
I'm a lesbian and I love her music. I love romantic music, but I don't always relate to it because it's often explicitly sung about a man. I think Mitski is a lot more introspective in regards to her experiences as a woman, which I find more relatable. The focus is on her and her own feelings, not some guy.
And even though in some songs it's clear she's singing about a man, there are plenty of songs that could be about either gender. I've always considered songs like A Loving Feeling to be more relatable to the LGBT experience.
Mitski hasn’t exactly stated her as bisexual she hasn’t put a label on her sexuality [https://www.reddit.com/r/mitski/s/aVTVtacLpv](https://www.reddit.com/r/mitski/s/aVTVtacLpv)
my opinion as a lesbian and avid mitski listener is that she writes a lot about herself, her experiences, her feelings, and very well so: it is vulnerable, real, and raw. i think that much of the queer community relates to her a lot as majority of us have struggled with our self identity. her words and her music become sort of a ‘voice’ in telling this sad, often depressing stories of queer people (even if she did not intend her songs to be that way). we relate to her music in a way we cannot relate to others because out of everyone, she has the most vulnerable lyrics that many would dare not write and put out to the world.
The previous comments already perfectly summarize it - how her lyrics talk about the experience and how it accurately captures that feeling of yearning and alienation, most especially as a poc woman.
That on top of being closeted or having to hide/repress your love in fear of a conservative society. Some of my favs case in point being: "I just need a quiet place where I can scream how I love you" "Then I wouldn't have to scream your name atop of every roof in the city of my heart" "But with everybody watching us, our every move, we do have reputation, we keep it secret, won't let them have it"
hahaha and to add, the closest explicitly queer lyric she has sung afaik is in cop car "I've loved many boys, I've loved many girls"
I'd say she has quite a few songs with obviously queer themes, but maybe it's only obvious to other sapphic people/lesbians and flies over straight heads. like pearl diver referencing an Emily Dickinson poem and being a reference to oral sex, Francis forever being covered for the lesbian couple in Adventure Time, pink in the night and come into the water as queer yearning songs, not wanting to be perceived as possibly predatory for acting on lesbian desires, which is a common struggle
“I’ve loved many boys, I’ve loved many girls” Cop Car
“But with everybody watching us, our every move, we do have reputations” Once More to See You
“I haven’t told anyone, just like we promised. Have you?” Old Friend
“Could you shine it down here for her?” My Love Mine All Mine
“Maybe I’m the same as all those men, writing songs of all they’re dreaming” Come Into The Water
bro have u not heard “cop car” “once more to see you” or “pink in the night” be fr 😭 sorry but this question is tone deaf, my fellow queers y’all are being too nice, anyone who actually listens to her music would know her music is most consumed by us gaysians and mentally ill <3 respectfully, if you don’t see it, then maybe you’re in the wrong place. I’m saying this as a genderqueer asian lesbian who is *tired* of explaining why & how our community matters/exists in spaces, esp to the straight community! happy pride month y’all
Personally as a queer person I feel its a few reasons,
a) Her music just has a lot of queer feelings strung through. Whether explicit like Cop Car or just very situational. Class of 2013 and any songs about parent/child relationships tend to resonate with a lot of queer people just because of a lot of queer people have parents who don't understand or want to understand their child because of their queerness.
b) Mitski is pretty. Like calling her mommy or something is weird but I don't think anyone can deny she is attractive.
c) The genre's she plays just have a lot of queer audience members who resonate with the music. Indie and alt genre's have very famously been run by queer artists
d) She's been pretty ambiguous abt her sexuality towards the public (obvi bc she's a person and doesn't need to say anything abt it) but a lot of the things she has said has shown her to be that she could like girls. Doesn't matter to like 99 percent of people (including me) but a lot of people like to know the person on stage is similar to them.
e) Her fandoms just a safe space.
My theory that she doesn't shy away from singing about her trauma, and there's just something about the LGBT community where we love to flock to trauma-centered media.
She has many songs that resonate with the queer community, such as ‘Real Men', 'Once More to See You', ‘Come Into the Water’, ‘Cop Car’, Etc etc. She also once made a Twitter post saying, 'I'm a Libra, so my sexuality is essentially "you can really be any gender as long as you treat me like a princess."' Which well, means she’s probably queer. Regardless, many of her songs provide comfort and connection to the queer community. I'm almost certain that 'Once More to See You' is specifically about being closeted (along with ‘A Loving Feeling’)
I never knew about the twitter post but she’s so real for that
Real tbh
I assume that pink in the night is also meant to resonate with queer community
Yeah probably
Obviously it's not the intended meaning but as a queer person, 'strawberry blond' also resonates with the experience of falling for a straight person of your same gender, knowing they won't reciprocate your feelings.
Yeah I was thinking that too but I didn’t want it to come off as offensive or anything.
I think as long as we acknowledge the original meaning and respect it, everyone is allowed to have their own interpretations as art is by nature interpretive
She’s so real
Real men is not anything about lgbtq, but the other two are, especially once more to see you
No I know, I’m just saying that the song resonates with a lot of queer people like myself. It’s not about being lgbt but it can definitely apply to transgender people, gay men, etc, more than some of her other songs do.
indie artist which automatically adds lgbt fans due to the genre + popular on tiktok for edits of fandoms, fandoms are predominately queer and in terms of lgbt representation, definitely not explicitly, but lots of the songs are about unrequited love which is common for lgbt people in adolescence to fall in love with a straight friend
So there’s a phenomenon in media where queer angst resides in music that’s in parallel to experiences actual queer people go through even though it’s not intended for queer people to listen to intrinsically.. , in her music she gives the idea of being ostracized in her relationships and going though loneliness in similar fashion gay men and women go through even though she is a straight woman , her early work is raw , bitter , angry and overall non conforming to music that’s about love in typical and superficial ways. Queerness goes a bit deeper especially because she’s a woman.
She in her early songs plays the guitar very messy , very loud , almost like she’s drunk and angry and she’s not trying to be pretty she’s just sensitive and upset , queerness is treated as excommunication and as a threat to a status quo , she challenges it by how she carries her ideas. Idk what her sexually is but it doesn’t matter
“Even though she is straight” Idk if I agree with this, I have no interest in speculating about someone’s sexuality but though she’s never labelled her sexuality publicly it’s repeatedly been made very clear that although she’s attracted to men, she’s not straight. She has chosen not to label herself explicitly publicly, but personally I think the reasonable solution to this is not to speculate by assuming she therefore must be straight. Especially when she’s said things outside her music that directly contradict this. I feel like we culturally tend to straight-wash queer women and make the assumption that if they’ve ever mentioned a man romantically/sexually, they MUST be het. I agree with what you’re saying, and think it’s a really good analysis but I’m not sure it all applies to Mitski, who is a) pretty happy to strongly hint she’s queer and b) very aware that many/most of her listeners are also. But I totally agree with your discussion of how queerness presents in her music and think it’s super well written. Sort of reminds me of Billie eilish. Everyone made a huge deal when she came out but I just remember being like….did we not know that?
I want clarify Idk if she’s straight , she never said it and it’s fine , it was just an assumption.
She isn’t. In Cop Car she says “I’ve loved many boys, I’ve loved many girls” and in one tweet she said smth like “I’m a libra, which means ‘you can be any gender as long as you treat me like a princess’”
adding onto this, in my love mine all mine she refers to her baby with feminine pronouns!
No worries I just wanted to add the other perspective because the post seemed confused that she’s got a fan base in a community that she’s definitely a part of. Like I said, I agree with your points and I think you nailed it whether from the assumption she’s straight or not. But I do think it’s a weird thing culturally rn that a woman can be pretty explicitly queer but without a super specific label we fall back on the assumption she MUST be straight.
I'm a lesbian and I love her music. I love romantic music, but I don't always relate to it because it's often explicitly sung about a man. I think Mitski is a lot more introspective in regards to her experiences as a woman, which I find more relatable. The focus is on her and her own feelings, not some guy. And even though in some songs it's clear she's singing about a man, there are plenty of songs that could be about either gender. I've always considered songs like A Loving Feeling to be more relatable to the LGBT experience.
exactly my thoughts!
Shes just built diffrent ig?
She's bisexual and a lot of LGBT themes are in her music
Mitski hasn’t exactly stated her as bisexual she hasn’t put a label on her sexuality [https://www.reddit.com/r/mitski/s/aVTVtacLpv](https://www.reddit.com/r/mitski/s/aVTVtacLpv)
"I've loved many boys, I've loved many girls" Queer, though, works just the same!
Herself*
my opinion as a lesbian and avid mitski listener is that she writes a lot about herself, her experiences, her feelings, and very well so: it is vulnerable, real, and raw. i think that much of the queer community relates to her a lot as majority of us have struggled with our self identity. her words and her music become sort of a ‘voice’ in telling this sad, often depressing stories of queer people (even if she did not intend her songs to be that way). we relate to her music in a way we cannot relate to others because out of everyone, she has the most vulnerable lyrics that many would dare not write and put out to the world.
Idk she just gets me
Real tbh
The previous comments already perfectly summarize it - how her lyrics talk about the experience and how it accurately captures that feeling of yearning and alienation, most especially as a poc woman. That on top of being closeted or having to hide/repress your love in fear of a conservative society. Some of my favs case in point being: "I just need a quiet place where I can scream how I love you" "Then I wouldn't have to scream your name atop of every roof in the city of my heart" "But with everybody watching us, our every move, we do have reputation, we keep it secret, won't let them have it" hahaha and to add, the closest explicitly queer lyric she has sung afaik is in cop car "I've loved many boys, I've loved many girls"
I'd say she has quite a few songs with obviously queer themes, but maybe it's only obvious to other sapphic people/lesbians and flies over straight heads. like pearl diver referencing an Emily Dickinson poem and being a reference to oral sex, Francis forever being covered for the lesbian couple in Adventure Time, pink in the night and come into the water as queer yearning songs, not wanting to be perceived as possibly predatory for acting on lesbian desires, which is a common struggle
YES YES YES !
Personally I found her through marceline which is a queer character
“I’ve loved many boys, I’ve loved many girls” Cop Car “But with everybody watching us, our every move, we do have reputations” Once More to See You “I haven’t told anyone, just like we promised. Have you?” Old Friend “Could you shine it down here for her?” My Love Mine All Mine “Maybe I’m the same as all those men, writing songs of all they’re dreaming” Come Into The Water
My Love Mine All Mine was about her and her feelings, not about anyone else. Just thought I'd clarify 👍
I know, but it still sounds gay as Hell, and most fans don’t know that’s what it’s about and interpret it as WLW. That’s why I kept it in
We LGBTs love any excuse to yearn and her music is yearning music.
You don’t just graduate from SUNY Purchase without having some close encounters of the LGBT kind
Because gay people have better taste
we don't get along with our mothers like mitski (mostly)
she's queer, she has multiple songs which obviously reference queer relationships
didn't she say once that most or all of makeout creek was written about a woman or am i just making up that memory
I think you may have gotten it mixed up with the time where she stated that some of her love songs are written about women.
Tbh idk either once my friend asked me about my Spotify wrap top artists and mitski was second and he said that my Spotify wrap is very gay..I am bi
idk any female artist that doesn’t have majority queer / a large queer audience.
Because shes gay too lol i dont think shes lesbian but definitely bi at least. Her song strawberry blonde is about liking a girl whos straight
Bc she is queer!!!!
Am i the only one whose straight but absolutely loves mitski😭
Def not haha but the indie scene generally has a decent bit more queer ppl than more mainstream genres so that’s why it’s a bit less common haha
bro have u not heard “cop car” “once more to see you” or “pink in the night” be fr 😭 sorry but this question is tone deaf, my fellow queers y’all are being too nice, anyone who actually listens to her music would know her music is most consumed by us gaysians and mentally ill <3 respectfully, if you don’t see it, then maybe you’re in the wrong place. I’m saying this as a genderqueer asian lesbian who is *tired* of explaining why & how our community matters/exists in spaces, esp to the straight community! happy pride month y’all
She has that vibe, like many female songwriters in the 90s: fearlessly embracing intelligent emotions
She's definitely not straight
why does it matter
Mitskis bi
I'm pretty sure mitski said that some of her songs are Sapphic, like once more to see you
indie artist + genre + super cool person + queer coded songs = lgbtq fans
Personally as a queer person I feel its a few reasons, a) Her music just has a lot of queer feelings strung through. Whether explicit like Cop Car or just very situational. Class of 2013 and any songs about parent/child relationships tend to resonate with a lot of queer people just because of a lot of queer people have parents who don't understand or want to understand their child because of their queerness. b) Mitski is pretty. Like calling her mommy or something is weird but I don't think anyone can deny she is attractive. c) The genre's she plays just have a lot of queer audience members who resonate with the music. Indie and alt genre's have very famously been run by queer artists d) She's been pretty ambiguous abt her sexuality towards the public (obvi bc she's a person and doesn't need to say anything abt it) but a lot of the things she has said has shown her to be that she could like girls. Doesn't matter to like 99 percent of people (including me) but a lot of people like to know the person on stage is similar to them. e) Her fandoms just a safe space.
My theory that she doesn't shy away from singing about her trauma, and there's just something about the LGBT community where we love to flock to trauma-centered media.