Japanese Breakfast is a band. Michelle Zauner calls herself their frontwoman and songwriter, but it’s still a band. Still, most listeners see Zauner as more than just the director of the band’s artistic vision or contributing music to it. In other words, we tend to see Japanese Breakfast as Zauner’s personal vehicle, or even what boils down to a stage name for the singer. And initially, this wasn’t far from the truth.

But there’s more to the reasoning behind this perception. The band’s debut album, 2016’s “Psychopomp,” was written against the backdrop of Zauner’s mother passing away from cancer in 2014. After hearing the news of her mother’s diagnosis, she returned to her hometown to take care of her family while writing songs for herself. The album cover features a photo of her mother in her 20s. The album also includes an instrumental of the same name with a recording of her mother saying, “Gwaenchanh-a, it’s okay,” in a comforting voice over the phone. She worked through missing her mother with Korean food, made clear in her 2016 essay “Love, Loss, and Kimchi” for “Glamour.” She expanded on the topic in her 2018 essay “Crying in H Mart” in “The New Yorker.” Does that title sound familiar? Not surprising if so—with encouragement from her publisher, Zauner made the essay into a full memoir in 2021. The first chapter of the book is nearly identical to her 2018 essay of the same name. And in the book, her mother’s words—“gwaenchanh-a … it’s okay”—resurface as the words that brought her solace all her life. Simply put, Zauner’s loss marked the starting point for Japanese Breakfast.

Following the publication of “Crying in H Mart” in 2021, Japanese Breakfast released their third album, “Jubilee,” which Zauner specifically wrote with a focus on jubilance rather than the grief she had been exploring over the previous five years. The most well-known track, “Be Sweet,” recorded prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, is an excellent riff on 1980s-inspired synth pop and new wave. That same year, “Crying in H Mart” became a long-running bestseller. Meanwhile, “Jubilee” topped numerous lists of the year’s best albums. In 2022, Japanese Breakfast was nominated for Grammys including Best New Artist and Best Alternative Music Album. What could come next after exploring loss and then singing about recovery or even transformation?

Zauner was refreshingly forthright with her answer. “I think that success afforded me a financial stability that’s really quite delightful. I’m still doing a version of the same things, just kind of on a larger scale,” she said. “It definitely has given me the privilege to take certain risks and make bigger splashes in my work.” We all know how such stories tend to unfold on TV—it’s the “weight of the crown” or “paradox of success” episode. And, judging by her comments in the same interview, Zauner is equally aware of this. “I think I’m in an interesting place because I know that the narrative of this record is starting to become, ‘She had an enormous year, but she was miserable inside,’” she continued. “That’s not at all what I’m interested in peddling. I think it was a natural move for me to want to make an album that was a little less extroverted and more delicate and complex.” But what exactly did she mean by that? What kind of album did she make next?

The first thing that stands out about “For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women)” is how it turns an imaginative eye toward the classics. For one, the album title is borrowed from American author John Cheever’s short story collection “The World of Apples.” Living in the imagination of a man dissatisfied with his marriage are “melancholy brunettes” and “sad women.” As Zauner says, she has a preference for titles that are “semi-obnoxious.” She cites Fiona Apple’s 1999 album “When the Pawn…” and the Smashing Pumpkins’ 1995 album “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” as albums whose titles carry a similar tone. As you listen through the tracks of “For Melancholy Brunettes,” it becomes clear they share a mix of similar relationships, literary references, and musical influences.

Take, for instance, the lead single, “Orlando in Love.” The title derives its name from the epic poem “Orlando Innamorato” by Renaissance poet Matteo Maria Boiardo. The knight Orlando’s adventures are reimagined with a modern conceit: being tempted by Sirens while camping oceanside. Zauner took the image of the birth of Venus further with the stage design for her Coachella performance, featuring a massive clamshell. She also drew directly from Virginia Woolf’s novel “Orlando: A Biography,” taking on dual, gender-fluid roles. Zauner ties these themes together with a sound reminiscent of Americana/folk and romantic indie rock from the 1990s and 2000s, evoking the work of Grant-Lee Phillips.

This specific era and its music proudly permeate the album. The second single, “Mega Circuit,” recalls Fiona Apple in the ’90s. Another highlight, “Picture Window,” feels like an update on the Wallflowers’ sound for the 2020s. Then there’s the very surprising and equally satisfying duet with Jeff Bridges, “Men in Bars.” Yes, Jeff Bridges of “The Big Lebowski” fame. Even though it’s no secret Bridges is as passionate about music as he is about acting, this collaboration with Zauner is still enough to catch you off guard. The duet is a country song that tells the same story but from two different perspectives, with the whole thing reminiscent of Nick Cave or Howe Gelb.

“For Melancholy Brunettes” marks the first time Japanese Breakfast took to a proper recording studio. Previous material had all been recording in impromptu settings like warehouses and lofts. They even brought in Blake Mills. Mills is known for his work on albums by Fiona Apple, Perfume Genius, and more, and was nominated Producer of the Year by the Grammys for Alabama Shakes’ 2015 album. It’s no wonder Japanese Breakfast not only expanded their sound with this release but that it sounds so particularly cohesive and polished.

This is not merely the journey of a DIY indie artist who finds mainstream success. Just as she’s always candidly pragmatic in interviews, Zauner has maintained her voice and worldview. Even with the recording equipment upgrade, influential producer, and newfound commercial success, this album remains deeply hers. The raw emotion of her bedroom recordings is still present, but now it’s wrapped up in sophisticated production value and refinement.

“For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women)” isn’t the closing chapter of a conflation of contradiction born from past events, nor is it the shadow the follows the light. In essence, what Zauner’s really doing is exercising the full extent of her creative freedom, using the finest entries of her personal catalog of musical influences to craft her best work yet—and she now has the resources to execute her vision flawlessly. The “bigger splashes” enabled by financial stability turn out to be tastefully understated.

Let’s end with a look at the album cover. Zauner is seen head down on a table stuffed with food and drink, a skull resting beside her, in the style of 17th-century Dutch vanitas still-life paintings. For Zauner, the memento mori point of the imagery behind the skull likely isn’t to point to life’s futility, as in the typical TV episodes mentioned earlier, but an attitude that shows you can live with your own sadness despite the changes around you. Success, after all, isn’t a gateway to emptiness or misery—it’s jubilant, for her and for us. You’ll be able to catch Japanese Breakfast again this June at the DMZ Peace Train Music Festival. Michelle Zauner spent her 2024 in Korea learning the language, and she’ll no doubt have even more stories to share with us in person come summer.