After releasing the more ironically than ever titled “No Time to Die” back in February, when people (ahem, Americans) still thought the movies were going to continue because COVID was China’s and Europe’s problem and that the Bond film of the same name couldn’t possibly be cancelled until next year, Eilish seemed to go all quiet on the musical front for a bit (save for releasing a tour video about body image called “Not My Responsibility”). Yet perhaps wanting to give her brother/producer, Finneas O’Connell, a gift in time for his July 30th birthday was motivation enough to offer up a thematic sequel called “My Future.”
Written at the beginning of the first quarantine (for we all know there’s another and another at play until this so-called vaccine gets approved), the dreamy, dreary sound of the track is Eilish business as usual, along with the lyrics that are, despite supposedly being rosier than her norm, but a reflection on the thoughts that come during lockdown malaise. One has to be hopeful about the future otherwise they’ll kill themselves, right? (wrong, for humans keep going thanks to being systematically programmed to do so even when presented with the grimmest shit). In the face of every evidence to the contrary, Eilish is insisting that it can only get better because it has to.
Thus, the major divergence in this particular song is the shift toward a more “upbeat” rhythm at the one minute, forty-three second mark. After ruminating on the past and the changes she wants to make–the changes she’s already gone through–with the lines, “I can’t seem to focus/And you don’t seem to notice I’m not here/I’m just a mirror/You check your complexion/To find your reflection’s all alone, I had to go,” Eilish slips into the excitement of a potentially brighter future (though, again, it’s difficult to fathom that even with the “it’s always darkest before the dawn” platitude–bitch, not when we’re living in the metaphorical landscape of winter in Antarctica for all of eternity).
The animated video (which sort of picks up where “Everything I Wanted” left off) continues the pandemic trend of not bothering with creating IRL concepts (see also: Dua Lipa’s “Hallucinate”)–unless you have the clout of Taylor Swift in making her “Cardigan” video. Otherwise, it’s nothing but Charli XCX and Ariana Grande/Justin Bieber “at-home stylings.” In keeping with the moody motif of the song, the video for “My Future” opens on a rainy landscape in which Eilish, illustrated with her signature green roots and black tresses, sits cross-legged staring at the moon as the rainfall pours down on her (one could easily replace the audio with “Rain On Me”). Her attire is also decidedly “socialist chic,” looking as though she’s wearing a government-issued mental hospital ensemble–which could definitely foretell the future indeed.
Walking along in the peaceful meadow where she’s found herself, she looks more resigned than hopeful. At the halfway point when the beat of the song picks up, it’s as though Eilish is taking a page from every music ingenue’s godmother, Dolly Parton, in adhering to the aphorism, “If you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.” So it is that the rain stops at this moment in the composition, with a barrage of plants bursting forth to show that there was a reason for all that gloom. One of the plants goes decidedly Jack and the Beanstalk on Eilish, taking her up toward the heights of the sun (who does she think she is, FKA Twigs in “cellophane”?).
The heavy-handedness of the video is tempered by the songwriting. Knowing better than to be full-stop Pollyanna about the future, Eilish instead seems to be cautiously realistic about seeing a shift back to the proverbial “normal” everyone is still lusting after with the final lines, “And I, I’m in love/But not with anybody here/I’ll see you in a couple years.” It’s effortless to be negative, they say. The harder thing is to be positive. So Eilish tries the latter in her musical metamorphosis–and yet, some might still say being positive is the provenance of the rich.
