If you’re about to make a big, life-altering decision that has the potential to go very, very badly, and these songs start playing, maybe take that as a sign to rethink your choices. While each track has a different attitude toward potential mistakes, they could all serve as warnings about making risky decisions. Or at least cautionary tales.
“A Mistake” by Fiona Apple
If you hear Fiona Apple’s 1999 track “A Mistake” playing somewhere right before making a risky decision, the universe could be trying to tell you something. But then again, it could be a sign to go through with your mistake anyway. Apple sings “So I’m gonna f**k it up again / I’m gonna do another detour”. But in the same verse also sings, “And when the day is done and I look back / And the fact is I had fun / Fumbling around / All the advice I shunned, and I ran / Where they told me not to run / But I sure had fun”.
So here is the eternal conundrum of “A Mistake”. On one hand, there’s a bad decision being made. But on the other, the risk was worth it. Is this a mistake that cost nothing, so the speaker can revel in it with no consequences except for herself? Or did she leave destruction and ruined lives in her wake? That’s for Fiona Apple to know and for us to speculate.
“Brand New City” by Mitski
Mitski’s 2012 track “Brand New City” also heralds mistakes, but like Fiona Apple, there are multiple sides to this story. The lyrics describe stagnation, rot, and decay. Staying in the same place so long that rigor mortis has set in, as described in the first verse. “Think my brain is rotting in places / I think my heart is ready to die / I think my body is falling in pieces / I think my blood is passing me by”. This first mistake could perhaps be in allowing life to grow dull and unbearable.
There’s a decision on the horizon. Could moving to a new place end the stagnation? Mitski addresses this in the bridge. “But if I gave up being pretty I wouldn’t know how to be alive / I should move to a brand new city and teach myself how to die”. Most likely, the stagnation would remain even in the brand new city. Because the rot is in you, not the place. And wherever you go, there you are.
“New Person, Same Old Mistakes” by Tame Impala
The title of Tame Impala’s 2015 track “New Person, Same Old Mistakes” hits the nail on the head. Hearing this playing while considering a potential life-altering change should have you rethinking some things. Are you making this decision for the right reasons? Is anything actually going to change? Will becoming a new person fix whatever is wrong inside you?
Like Mitski’s “Brand New City”, moving away won’t solve a problem of your own making. What “New Person, Same Old Mistakes” says is that sometimes a complete metamorphosis doesn’t always fix everything. And so you make decisions to change superfluous things about yourself, but that doesn’t get to the root of the problem. Those decisions end up being useless. You are a brand new person, but you still have the same old behaviors.
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