Analyzing Mitski’s New Album: Horror References and Intertextuality for Music Essays

Hook: Turn Mitski’s horror references into essay fuel — fast

Struggling to turn song references and music-video imagery into a clear, grade-ready argument? You’re not alone. Students and teachers in 2026 face a flood of multimedia texts, shallow online takes, and AI-generated summaries that obscure close reading. This guide shows how to use Mitski’s new album, Nothing’s About to Happen to Me — and its explicit nods to Grey Gardens and The Haunting of Hill House — as a case study to build airtight essays for literature and music coursework.

TL;DR — The most important takeaway first

Mitski’s announcement (Jan 2026) and the single “Where’s My Phone?” use a Shirley Jackson quote and visual horror cues to craft a protagonist: a reclusive woman whose interior world clashes with an outside gaze. Treat these references as active devices: they don’t just decorate the songs; they shape characterization, theme, and audience expectation. Use a structured intertextuality method (identify, categorize, contextualize, close-read, synthesize) to build thesis-driven essays that work across music, film, and literary studies.

Why intertextuality matters in 2026 media studies

Intertextuality is no longer an optional analytic skill. By 2026, coursework and assessment increasingly reward multimodal literacy — the ability to read lyrics, visual codes, and publicity stunts (phone lines, ARG-style websites) as connected texts. Recent trends include:

• Instructors accepting multimodal essays and timed portfolio submissions.
• Short-form video essays and podcasts shaping classroom discourse — useful, but often surface-level.
• Widespread use of AI tools for transcription and source-finding; universities emphasizing proper attribution and critical oversight — and new guides for using Gemini-guided workflows.

So: learning to analyze intertextuality lets you translate pop culture materials into scholarly arguments that meet updated rubrics and resist simplistic takes.

Context: What Mitski announced in early 2026

On Jan 16, 2026, press coverage noted Mitski’s next album, Nothing’s About to Happen to Me, and a single, “Where’s My Phone?,” whose promo included a phone hotline and a website. The phone recording features Mitski reading a line from Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House:

“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality.” — Shirley Jackson

Rolling Stone reported that the album frames a “reclusive woman in an unkempt house” who is deviant outside and free inside; Mitski also said the record will channel Grey Gardens (the documentary about the Beales) and Jackson’s Hill House world. These are deliberate intertextual choices — not merely fandom nods.

Quick primer: Grey Gardens and Hill House as source texts

Grey Gardens (1975 documentary; multiple cultural afterlives)

Core themes: isolation, decline and preservation, performer identity vs domestic reality, aging, queer subtext, and the blurred public/private boundary. Iconic images include cluttered interiors, flamboyant costume choices, and close attention to gestures. Use Grey Gardens to read a song-protagonist’s domestic space as character-building.

The Haunting of Hill House (Shirley Jackson, 1959)

Core themes: subjective sanity, unreliable perception, the house-as-mind metaphor, Gothic atmosphere, and the tension of interior vs. exterior reality. The Jackson quote Mitski uses signals that the album will probe mental states and reality’s instability.

Step-by-step framework for analyzing intertextuality in songs and music videos

Use this reliable framework for essays or close-reading assignments. Each step is actionable and exam-friendly.

1. Identify the reference
   • Find explicit textual markers: quoted lines, direct name-drops, visual iconography (costumes, set design), or promotional ARGs (phone lines, websites).
   • Example: Mitski’s hotline reads Jackson’s line; press materials reference Grey Gardens.
2. Categorize the intertextuality
   • Is it a quotation, allusion, pastiche, homage, or adaptation? Genette’s transtextual categories are useful here.
   • Example: The Shirley Jackson quote is a direct quotation; visual nods to Grey Gardens are allusive/pastiche.
3. Contextualize source texts
   • Briefly note the original work’s themes, historical moment, and cultural significance. Use concise secondary sources — e.g., documentary histories for Grey Gardens, literary criticism for Jackson.
4. Close-read the target text
   • For lyrics: analyze diction, pronoun use, syntactic shifts, metaphors.
   • For video: analyze mise-en-scène (set, color, costume), cinematography (camera movement, framing), sound design (silence, diegetic sounds), and editing. See resources on lighting and spatial audio for practical cues when describing sound and image.
   • Document timestamps and frame grabs for evidence — instructors increasingly expect precise references in multimodal essays.
5. Analyze function
   • Ask: What does the reference do? Does it create sympathy, irony, distance, or critique? Does it reframe the protagonist through a known narrative (e.g., the tragic eccentric of Grey Gardens)?
6. Synthesize into an argument
   • Move from observation to claim: build a thesis showing how intertextual devices produce meaning across modes (audio, visual, paratext).
7. Document and attribute
   • Cite the original sources and press materials (e.g., Rolling Stone, artist statements). If you used AI tools for transcription, note that in your methods section per your course’s policy; see guidance on governance and versioning prompts and models when documenting tool use.

Tools and tactics (practical, classroom-ready)

• Transcription: Use Gemini-guided workflows or tools like Otter.ai or Descript for first-pass transcripts; always check against the audio.
• Frame-grabs: VLC or QuickTime for exact frames and timestamps.
• Citation managers: Zotero for media sources; include URLs and access dates for dynamic content (like the hotline).
• Archive and evidence storage: Use Google Drive/Tropy to keep screenshots and notes organized for submission.
• Audio analysis: Audacity or Sonic Visualiser / spatial audio resources for waveform/tempo notes if you discuss arrangement or dynamics.

Applying the method: concrete examples from Mitski’s rollout

1) The Shirley Jackson quotation — anchor your intro

That hotline recording is a clear, attributable intertextual device. In an essay, you can open with the quote and perform two moves quickly: 1) identify Jackson’s thesis on sanity vs reality; 2) link it to the protagonist’s condition in Mitski’s record. This both grounds your argument and signals scholarly precision.

2) Grey Gardens references — read the house as character

Grey Gardens invites readings of domestic space as identity. If Mitski’s press release frames a “reclusive woman in an unkempt house,” investigate how the music and visuals render domestic detritus: does clutter stand in for memory? Costume choices for the protagonist may echo Big and Little Edie’s performative pasts; camera intimacy (close-ups on hands, textiles) can mimic documentary observation. Argue how these signs create sympathy while also commenting on the social gaze that frames reclusion as deviance.

3) Visual and sonic Gothic — Hill House as psychological frame

The Jackson quote primes listeners to read a haunted-house metaphor. In video analysis, look for Gothic conventions: dim, high-contrast lighting, jarring edits, eco-sound (creaks, distant birdcalls), and spaces that distort scale via lenses. Musically, minor-key shifts, unsettling intervals, or abrupt dynamic drops can produce the same cognitive dissonance Jackson described.

Sample thesis statements you can adapt

• “By quoting Shirley Jackson and evoking Grey Gardens’ interiors, Mitski’s new album stages the home as a site of both refuge and public judgment, using Gothic sound design and documentary aesthetics to argue that reclusion is a form of self-fashioning rather than mere decline.”
• “Mitski’s ‘Where’s My Phone?’ uses intertextual quotation and horror iconography to align subjective unreliability with technological anxiety — suggesting that privacy, memory, and sanity are mediated in the late-capitalist phone era.”
• “Through pastiche of Grey Gardens and Hill House, Mitski collapses queer domestic performance with Gothic interiority, producing a feminist critique of how culture reads eccentric feminine bodies.”

How to structure a 1,200–1,500 word essay (classic model)

1. Introduction (150–200 words): Hook, context (Mitski announcement, Jackson quote), thesis statement.
2. Background (150–250 words): Brief note on Grey Gardens and Hill House relevance; cite scholarship or reviews.
3. Close-read section 1 (300–400 words): Lyrics and sonic analysis that show the album’s interiority.
4. Close-read section 2 (300–400 words): Music video/mise-en-scène, with timestamps and still descriptions.
5. Synthesis and implications (150–250 words): What your reading says about the artist, genre, or cultural moment.
6. Conclusion (100–150 words): Re-state significance, suggest further research (e.g., fan reaction, reception studies, comparative analysis with other artists using similar intertexts).

Sample paragraph (quick model you can adapt)

Topic sentence: Mitski’s decision to foreground a Shirley Jackson sentence via a promotional hotline immediately frames the album’s perspective as one of psychological instability rather than objective fact. Evidence: The Jackson line — “No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality” — appears on the artist’s official hotline (Jan 2026). Analysis: By placing this quote outside the song itself, Mitski creates a paratext that orients listeners before the first note: we’re invited to interpret domestic scenes and unreliable narrators through a Gothic lens. The hotline’s disembodied voice mimics Hill House’s oppressive atmosphere and sets up a tension between public announcement and private confession. Conclusion: Thus the paratext functions rhetorically, cueing a reading that privileges interiority and subjective reality — an interpretive move that the music and visuals then complicate.

Advanced strategies and 2026-specific considerations

• ARGs and paratext: Mitski’s phone and website are part of a marketing ecology. Treat such paratexts as primary sources and analyze their role in shaping readings — see writing on cross-platform content workflows for how promotional channels reshape interpretation.
• AI tools: Use AI for transcripts or preliminary pattern-finding, but check outputs and attribute uses; don’t use generative tools to produce interpretive claims without human verification. See practical implementation guides for tool use and documentation (Gemini workflows).
• Multimodal submissions: If your instructor allows video essays, integrate frame-stills and waveform clips — still cite everything and include timecodes in a reference list. For technical guidance on integrating sound and image, consult resources on studio-to-street lighting & spatial audio.
• Ethical/source issues: When using clips, follow fair use guidelines. By 2026, many universities have updated multimedia fair-use primers — consult your library’s copyright office.

Common pitfalls and how to avoid them

• Overclaiming: Don’t assert an artist’s intent without sourcing interviews or press releases.
• Surface-level allusion-spotting: Explain what a reference does, not just that it exists.
• Ignoring paratext: Press materials, hotlines, and visuals all shape meaning; do not treat the song as isolated.
• Poor documentation: Always timestamp and screenshot; vague references weaken grades.

Quick grading checklist (for students and teachers)

• Clear thesis linking intertextual references to a distinct claim (30%).
• Specific evidence with timestamps/screenshots/quotations (25%).
• Contextualization of source texts (15%).
• Argumentative coherence and synthesis across modes (20%).
• Proper citations and ethical use of AI/paratexts (10%).

Further reading & cited frameworks

• Julia Kristeva, key essays on intertextuality (1966) — foundational theory.
• Gérard Genette, Palimpsests — transtextual relations and terminology.
• Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation (2006) — useful for adaptation/pastiche analysis.
• Rolling Stone coverage of Mitski’s Jan 16, 2026 announcement (Brenna Ehrlich) — primary press source for the album rollout.
• From Album Notes to Art School Portfolios: Turning Song Stories into Visual Work — a practical guide to converting sonic narratives into visual projects.

Final takeaways — actionable steps you can use today

1. Play the hotline and transcribe the Jackson quote; use it as an epigraph in your intro and explain its function.
2. Pick one song and one video from Mitski’s rollout and create a two-column evidence sheet: left = timestamp/quote/frame; right = analysis sentence.
3. Draft a thesis that explicitly connects an intertextual source (Grey Gardens or Hill House) to one rhetorical effect (e.g., sympathy, unreliability, critique).
4. Use the grading checklist to self-assess before submission.

Call to action

Turn Mitski’s intertextual world into your next strong essay: pick a song, apply the framework above, and post your thesis and one paragraph in the asking.website community for peer feedback. Need a template or annotated example? Request a model paragraph with timestamps and I’ll provide one tailored to your chosen track.

Credits: Reporting on Mitski’s album rollout is based on coverage from Jan 16, 2026 (Rolling Stone). For theoretical models of intertextuality and adaptation, see Kristeva, Genette, and Hutcheon (cited above).

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