Demystifying Father John Misty

Music media has a problem with regards to how much artistic leeway they’re willing to grant anyone remotely hirsute. If you have even the semblance of a beard, you can get away with anything including operating under a boring bullshit guise.

With the recent release of Father John Misty’s anticipated sophomore record, the regrettably titled, I Love You, Honeybear, this problem comes into even sharper relief.

Father John Misty is an American musician named Josh Tillman, who after leaving his post as drummer of the now defunct Fleet Foxes, began to ply his trade as a solo artist. While his move seemed like professional suicide at the time, it now appears to be a perfect case of getting out while you are ahead.

Both of Tillman’s records to date are certainly good listens, but what has catapulted him to cult status is his Jim Morrison-like penchant for lithe stage antics, and the dutiful attention the press has paid to documenting his self-destructive debauchery.

After quitting his drumming job, Tillman drove down the West Coast in the throes of a deep depression and enjoyed a good few trips on shrooms before settling down in a self-described “spider-shack” to pound out a novel that was printed in the record sleeve of his first album.

While this journalist-propelled yarn has reached mythic proportions, it has failed to make Tillman any more interesting in that every condescending dude-bro who’s ever worked at a record shop has entertained that same escapist plan of getting stoned and making art.

His rampant past makes his newfound switch to sentimental lovelorn lyrics layered with lush orchestration a bit of a surprise, but the change in territory is to be expected when considering that Tillman got married in 2013. What is nauseating about this whole debacle is the way that the press have lapped at his feet and acted as if the man is solely responsible for discovering and writing songs about love.

The irony that Tillman continues to cloak himself in is infuriating because while we ask that female musicians give us authenticity and chastise them when they don’t comply with our definition of it — see Lana Del Rey, and any number of female artists — Tillman has been able to build his career on totally avoiding it.

I don’t know who to blame more, the media for crafting this grand bildungsroman narrative around him, or Tillman for going along with their bullshit, but for a man who sings about not buying into systems, Tillman certainly seems content to buy into the hype-machine.