The Singles Jukebox

To be fair, we have loved you more…

[Video]
[6.88]

Oliver Maier: Mitski’s latest pop ventures feel less exhausting to me than those of pretty much any other ascendant indie star because they a) are better and b) do not reek of compromise. Fundamentally it’s just a sequined outfit on the same body made of crushed little stars; there’s no pretense of this being her Most Personal Music Yet™ and, despite the name, “Love Me More” feels less like a peek into her love life than a manifesto from someone with no idea what they’re actually after. A totally opaque synth-pop crystal, owing a little to “Maniac” both musically and in the vision of its protagonist, a flailing dancefloor apparition fighting for something beyond words. Mitski reveals nothing as she bares everything.
[7]

John Pinto: “But I never wave bye-bye/But I try/I try/Never gonna fall for….”
[7]

Will Adams: Mitski’s own “Stupid Love”, swapping existentialism for exuberance via anxiously repeated lines, swerves into different keys and a chorus that takes cues from melodramatic ’80s synthpop. If you’re going to ruminate on fame, might as well go full tilt.
[7]

Alfred Soto: Most interesting when her pinprick-sized songs struggle to contain their tumult, Mitski isn’t going for small on “Love Me More.” She takes the title seriously: more more more. The strain shows. Does she envy Florence Welch? 
[6]

Nortey Dowuona: The drums here are so soft they can barely hold the swiping claws that grow from the guitars and the sweeping wings of the synths, the bassline so swallowed it is barely visible in Mitski’s arms as she softly carries it with her soft yet strong voice. A pealing piano line scythes through the song and lets Mitski scurry the bassline away into the foreground, letting her calmly carry it through the now flapping synth wings, which are changing color as the drums stumble and struggle, then regain their presence and fade to a shimmering hi hat line, disappearing into the clouds. Mitski walks away with the contentedly sleeping bassline.
[8]

Vikram Joseph: A sort of successor to and inversion of “Nobody”, in which Mitski drains as much pathos from partnership as she did from loneliness. The coruscating synths in the chorus sounds like she’s being hunted down by her own existential dread, even as she begs her lover to “drown it out”: this is love as a coping mechanism, practically dissociated from romance or desire. I can’t quite articulate, though, what part of it leaves me untouched — for all its manic energy and accomplished songcraft, it’s an oddly sanitised version of desperation, one that slips down a little too easily. It just feels like this should hurt more, y’know?
[7]

Tim de Reuse: The metaphors are sharp as ever; “love enough to drown me out” is a plea that requires exactly as much straightforward repetition as she gives it. The backdrop lacks the snappy brightness of Be the Cowboy, so it is trying to be something else, but what is it, exactly? It’s too muddy and dark to aim for disco highs, and not warm enough to reach for sawtooth-fetish synthwave tropes (which, tired as they are, would at least have been something). Mitski’s adventurous chord changes try to uplift the post-chorus, but the instrumental does not have the energy to get propelled by a sense of surprise, and so the clanky piano interlude sits in memory like an ugly smear of ink. This is not by any means a bad song, but it is strange to hear something from an artist whose work typically has such a clear identity and sense of purpose feel so utterly confused.
[5]

Hannah Jocelyn: On first listen, “Love Me More” is the Mitski Mission Statement; she craves love that falls as fast as a body from the balcony so she doesn’t need to be brave, the kind of love that makes her love everybody. Years on from those songs, she knows better, but she’s just so tired of not feeling loved that she’s left trading those elaborate lyrics for simplistic idioms, begging a lover to “scratch the itch” and adore her. The chorus could be a reasonable request to an avoidant partner, or (as it is here) a desperate plea from an anxiously attached one; Mitski sings that title fully aware that no amount of love can fill the void. That amount of urgency deserves a Jim Steinman-sized treatment, one that longtime producer Patrick Hyland can’t quite pull off. The drum machines should be propelling the song forward, instead they’re buried under layers of synths — only the sophisti-pop pianos manage to crawl out of the glitter-encrusted swamp. After seeing her disappointment with her reputation as music for “sad bitches,” that slightness might be deliberate self-sabotage. Even if that’s intentional, the choice undersells how good this song is fundamentally — a reminder that the time signature jumps and modulations are just as integral to Mitski’s music as her abject loneliness. Her vocal performance ultimately picks up the slack, simmering with self-loathing but intensely theatrical all the same.
[8]