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Mar 21, 2025 By Mark Redfern Photography by Pak Bae

Japanese Breakfast (aka Michelle Zauner) has released a new album, For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women), today via Dead Oceans. Stream the new album here, as well as watching the new video for the album’s “Picture Window” and reading our rave review of the LP. Check out the video and album stream below. Read our review, which we posted yesterday, here. Also below are Japanese Breakfast’s upcoming tour dates.

Zauner had this to say about For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women) in a press release: “Over the course of promoting this new album I’ve often been asked to clarify the difference between melancholy and sadness. I think of melancholy as a kind of anticipatory grief, one that comes from an acknowledgment of the passage of time, from the recognition of mortality and finitude. In some way, too, I think it marks the artist’s condition, constantly observing through that lens. ‘Nothing thicker than a knife’s blade separates happiness from melancholy,’ Virginia Woolfe writes. I wanted this album to capture the moments where that knife slips. When people want too much, when they cede to temptation, when they are seduced and punished.”

Of “Picture Window” and its video Zauner says: “Ever since I was a young girl I’ve dealt with intrusive thoughts of loved ones dying horrible deaths. When someone is running late or they’ve neglected a text or even if they’re just looking over a balcony, my mind has a tendency to run to the worst case scenario, a reflex only exacerbated by my experience of many real deaths. It can be both a relief and a struggle to love someone who doesn’t share this same proclivity for anxiety. ‘Picture Window’ explores that dynamic.

“We shot the video while I was living in Seoul last year. My idea was to follow a couple, constantly tracking left to right, as one partner charges boldly forward and the other, progressively anxious, becomes increasingly reluctant to follow.

“When I met Omega from Balming Tiger, I knew immediately he would be perfect for the first role, his energy and charm were so readily apparent. Gyuri Kim, with her feeling for melancholy and uncertainty, turned out to be a wonderful counterpart.

“I wanted this video to feel like a short film, and watching it back, it’s bittersweet to look back on my year abroad—the wonderful people I met, the neighborhoods I loved and lived in. The constant tracking from left to right is a reminder of how time continues to pass no matter how forcefully you struggle to beat it back or rush to get ahead of it. I watch out the window as the scenery passes, visualizing all my unlived lives swishing past.”

Previously Japanese Breakfast shared the album’s first single, “Orlando in Love,” which was one of our Songs of the Week. Then she shared the album’s second single, “Mega Circuit,” via a music video. “Mega Circuit” was also one of our Songs of the Week.

For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women) is the follow-up to Jubilee, which was our #1 album of 2021 and landed Japanese Breakfast on the cover of our print magazine (buy a copy directly from us here or read our cover story interview here). In 2021 Zauner also put out her acclaimed debut memoir, Crying In H Mart, on Knopf. The book debuted at #2 on The New York Times’ Hardcover Nonfiction Best Sellers List and is being adapted into a film.

Speaking of all the success she had with her last album and memoir and how it impacted the new album, Zauner says in a press release: “I felt seduced by getting what I always wanted. I was flying too close to the sun, and I realized if I kept going I was going to die.”

Blake Mills produced For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women), which was recorded at Sound City in Los Angeles, where classic albums such as After the Gold Rush, Fleetwood Mac, and Nevermind were also made. One song on the album features legendary actor/musician Jeff Bridges.

Also read our 2017 interview with Japanese Breakfast on Soft Sounds From Another Planet.

Japanese Breakfast Tour Dates:

Mar 22 - New York, NY @ El Museo del Barrio - SOLD OUT
Apr 12 & 19 - Indio, CA @ Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival
Apr 23 - Austin, TX @ ACL Live at the Moody Theater *
Apr 24 - Dallas, TX @ South Side Ballroom *
Apr 26 - Atlanta, GA @ The Tabernacle *
Apr 27 - Charlotte, NC @ The Fillmore *
Apr 28 - Nashville, TN @ Ryman Auditorium *
Apr 30 - Chicago, IL @ Salt Shed *
May 01 - Chicago, IL @ Salt Shed * - SOLD OUT
May 02 - Chicago, IL @ Salt Shed * - SOLD OUT
May 03 - Detroit, MI @ The Fillmore *
May 05 - Toronto, ON @ Massey Hall * - SOLD OUT
May 06 - Toronto, ON @ Massey Hall *
May 07 - Boston, MA @ MGM Music Hall at Fenway *
May 09 - Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount * - SOLD OUT
May 10 - Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount * - SOLD OUT
May 11 - Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount * - SOLD OUT
May 12 - Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Paramount *
May 15 - Philadelphia, PA @ The Met Philadelphia *
May 16 - Philadelphia, PA @ The Met Philadelphia * - SOLD OUT
Jun 03 - Sydney, AU @ Vivid LIVE at Sydney Opera House
Jun 05 - Melbourne, AU @ RISING at PICA
Jun 07 - Auckland, NZ @ Auckland Town Hall
Jun 11 - Tokyo, JP @ Zepp Shunkjuku
Jun 13 - Osaka, JP @ Club Quattro
Jun 15 - Cheorwon-gun, KR @ DMZ Peace Train Music Festival
Jun 21 - Milwaukee, WI @ Summerfest
Jun 24 - Oslo, NO @ Rockefeller
Jun 25 - Stockholm, SE @ Filadelfia #
Jun 26 - Copenhagen, DK @ VEGA #
Jun 28 - Pilton, UK @ Glastonbury Festival
Jun 29 - Manchester, UK @ Academy 1 #
Jun 30 - Glasgow, UK @ Barrowland #
Jul 01 - Bristol, UK @ O2 Academy Bristol #
Jul 03 - London, UK @ O2 Academy Brixton #
Jul 4-6 - Ewijk, NL @ Down The Rabbit Hole 2025
Jul 05 - Utrecht, NL @ TivoliVredenburg #
Jul 08 - Paris, FR @ Le Trianon #
July 10 - Bilbao, ES @ Bilbao BBK Live
July 27 - Portland, OR @ Project Pabst
Aug 23 - Santa Barbara, CA @ Santa Barbara Bowl *
Aug 27 - San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic *
Aug 28 - San Francisco, CA @ The Masonic * - SOLD OUT
Aug 30 - Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater *
Sep 01 - Vancouver, BC @ The Orpheum *
Sep 02 - Seattle, WA @ Woodland Park Amphitheater *
Sep 03 - Seattle, WA @ Woodland Park Amphitheater *
Sep 05 - Salt Lake City, UT @ Twilight Concert Series @ Pioneer Park * ^
Sep 06 - Denver, CO @ The Mission Ballroom *
Sep 09 - St Paul, MN @ The Palace Theater *
Sep 10 - Madison, WI @ The Sylvee *

* w/ Ginger Root
# w/ Minhwi Lee
^ w/ Tomper

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