Father John Misty sheds his pseudonym on the track "The Night Josh Tillman Came to Our Apartment," a song from his most recent album, inspired by feelings he was having after a hookup. Upon first listen, the lyrics initially come off cruel, at times humorous, but overall mean-spirited. Upon multiple listens, and especially after the music video was released, it became clear that these feelings were not rooted in his feeling towards this stereotype he makes up, but instead they exist just as strongly towards himself.
Father John Misty, who is Josh Tillman in real life, talks of a type of girl in the opening lines, “I just love the kind of woman who can walk over a man.” It starts promising, but throughout the song, he cuttingly remarks all of his least favorite qualities of hers. It really does begin to seem that he actually doesn't like the girl at all, insulting her self-centered worldview and her intelligence again and again. It doesn't take long for him to begin coming off as a jerk to the listener. Upon listening closer, however, it becomes clear that it might be intentional.
For example, early in the song he makes fun of the girl's misuse of the word "literally," calling it a "malapropism," saying, "I wonder if she even knows what that word means." The irony comes in that while the narrator sees himself a linguistic expert, her use of literally is technically not a malapropism, showing he's guilty of the same crime and ultimately doesn't have the right to act like an intellectual and dismiss her. Many of his complaints are rooted in the idea that she doesn't know what she's talking about, that she's been told by too many men that she's wise beyond her years. Once it becomes clear that he is just as narcissistic and self righteous as she is, many of these complaints lose their footing completely.
All of this is reinforced by the music video, in which Josh Tillman meets himself at a bar, follows himself back to his apartment to do drugs, swim in the pool, and hook up with himself. All to leave himself in the morning sporting his doppelgangers hat. He remarks, "Special thanks to my body double Tyler, who I had to kiss no fewer than two dozen times and whose breath I can still smell in my mind's eye."
The message he is trying to push with this imagery is pretty clear, and affirms the suspicions that he was entirely intending to come off as a jerk. In the end, he is no different from the person who he is hooking up with in this story, and therefore has no right to be saying such things. But these comments also stem from this hatred for himself, as he's playing both parts in the music video, all of his comments are actually directed at himself. Josh Tillman remarks ,"This video is partially inspired by the LeBron James quote, 'It is precisely the superficial differences between people who are otherwise alike that inform the hostilities between them.'
"It's your male impotent rage. It's a portrait of wounded narcissism," he elaborates in a quote from an interview in Uncut Magazine. It explains how he can have such an attraction to himself, but feel loathing for it at the same time. It also serves to break the narrator's view of the gendered stereotypes, as he's calling himself out as a sexist. "It's not so much about this girl or this episode so much as it is about my self- hatred. But it is the darker aspects of my experience that inspire me to write. I think it's sort of a bait and switch, because maybe at first listen it just appears to be this indignant, self-righteous dressing down of this girl. But on repeated listens, you realize it's a narrator here who is this total asshole. I was in the low place, trying to bolster my esteem. It's a despicable song!"
"The a--hole in that song is me," Tillman admitted in an interview with Q Magazine. "I left that experience feeling like a f--king worthless human being. It's a destructive song and it's definitely one that I will not perform after this album cycle."
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