Miley Cyrus: NPR Tiny Desk (Home) Concert
This is one of my favorite things on the Internet. I love this video so much. This is my favorite cover of this song EVER. Miley is gorgeous and amazing. And I anxiously await pretty much EVERY NPR Tiny Desk Concert ever. So this was the perfect combination. Thank You NPR and Miley for this absolute masterpiece!
Premiered Jan 28, 2021
The Tiny Desk is working from home for the foreseeable future. Introducing NPR Music’s Tiny Desk (home) concerts, bringing you performances from across the country and the world. It’s the same spirit — stripped-down sets, an intimate setting — just a different space.
Miley Cyrus has always understood that music is theater. So it’s no surprise that, visiting the imaginative space that is the Tiny Desk, she transforms it into something both fantastical and true to her topsy-turvy Mileyness.
Cyrus ruled preteen hearts on the small screen before mastering pop stardom’s big stages, and throughout her career she’s played with sound and image in unexpected and even controversial ways. And she’s never balanced pop’s glorious artifice with her own soulful authenticity more self-assuredly than she does on her latest album, the rock and roll manifesto Plastic Hearts.
Here, the scene opens with Cyrus, dressed head to toe in rock-star faux fur, in what looks like a teenage girl’s bedroom. But the perspective in this pink-and-purple space feels a little … odd. As Cyrus sings, it becomes clear that this is her Wonderland – like Alice full of magical cake, she’s grown to exceed her surroundings. By the end of this three-song set, Cyrus reveals that it’s the adolescent enclave that grew too small for her, not the other way around.
The songs Cyrus offers are as direct and affecting as the set is whimsical. Cyrus has lately proven herself one of pop’s great interpretive vocalists, and she scores another triumph with her version of Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You,” a hazy psychedelic anthem that she infuses with just the edge of the next day’s hangover. The two songs from Plastic Hearts that follow are her own bids at classic-rock timelessness. In “Golden G-String” Cyrus assesses her own life in the spotlight with Leonard Cohen-esque charm. And “Prisoner” is the power ballad that lets Cyrus really break out – as she leaves the tiny room — just a box, it turns out, on a soundstage – and joins her band, she’s as free and self-confident as she’s ever been.
SET LIST
“Fade Into You”
I want to hold the hand inside you
I want to take the breath that’s true
I look to you, and I see nothing
I look to you to see the truth
You live your life, you go in shadows
You’ll come apart, and you’ll go black
Some kind of night into your darkness
Colors your eyes with what’s not there
Fade into you
Strange you never knew
Fade into you
I think it’s strange you never knew
A stranger’s light comes on slowly
A stranger’s heart without a home
You put your hands into your head
And then smiles cover your heart
Fade into you
Strange you never knew
Fade into you
I think it’s strange you never knew
Fade into you
Strange you never knew
Fade into you
I think it’s strange you never knew
I think it’s strange you never knew
“Golden G-String”
I woke up in Montecito
I was thinking about my life
And the questions made more questions
Staring out into the night
Yes, I’ve worn the golden g-string
Put my hand into hellfire
I did it all to make you love me
And to feel alive
Oh, that’s just the world that we’re living in
The old boys hold all the cards and they ain’t playing gin
You dare to call me crazy, have you looked around this place?
I should walk away
Oh, I should walk away
But I think I’ll stay
There are layers to this body
Primal sex and primal shame
They told me I should cover it
So I went the other way
I was trying to own my power
Still I’m trying to work it out
And at least it gives the papers
Something they can write about
And, oh, that’s just the world that we’re living in
The old boys hold all the cards and they ain’t playing gin
And you dare to call me crazy, have you looked around this place?
I should walk away
Oh, I should walk away
But I think I’ll stay
So, the mad man’s in the big chair
And his heart’s an iron vault
He says, “If you can’t make ends meet, honey
It must be your fault”
We all focus on the winners
And get blinded by their shine
Maybe caring for each other’s
Just too 1969
But oh, that’s just the world that we’re living in
The old boys hold all the cards and they ain’t playing gin
And you dare to call me crazy, have you looked around this place?
I should walk away
Oh, I should walk away
But I think I’ll stay
Yeah, I think I’ll stay
I just can’t walk away
So, I think I’ll stay
I can’t walk away
“Prisoner”
Prisoner, prisoner
Locked up, can’t get you off my mind, off my mind
Lord knows I tried a million times, million times, oh whoa
Why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
Strung out on a feeling, my hands are tied
Your face on my ceiling, I fantasize
Oh, I can’t control it, I can’t control it
I try to replace it with city lights
I’ll never escape it, I need the high
Oh, I can’t control it, I can’t control it
You keep making it harder to stay
But I still can’t run away
I gotta know why can’t you
Why can’t you just let me go?
Prisoner, prisoner
Locked up, can’t get you off my mind, off my mind
Lord knows I tried a million times, million times, oh whoa
Why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
Prisoner, prisoner
Locked up, can’t get you off my mind, off my mind
Lord knows I tried a million times, million times, oh whoa
Why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
I tasted heaven now I can’t live without it
I can’t forget you and your love is the loudest
Oh, I can’t control it, I can’t control it
You keep making it harder to stay
But I still can’t run away
I gotta know why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
Prisoner, prisoner
Locked up, can’t get you off my mind, off my mind
Lord knows I tried a million times, million times, oh whoa
Why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
Prisoner, prisoner
Locked up, can’t get you off my mind, off my mind
Lord knows I tried a million times, million times, oh whoa
Why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
(Prisoner)
Can’t get you off my mind
Why can’t you just let me go?
Million times
I wanna know why can’t you, why can’t you?
I wanna know why can’t you, why can’t you?
I gotta know why can’t you, why can’t you just let me go?
MUSICIANS
Miley Cyrus: vocals
Stacy Jones: drums
Mike Schmid: keys
Max Bernstein: guitar
Jamie Arentzen: guitar
Joe Ayoub: bass
CREDITS
Producer: Johnny Pascucci
Director: Alana O’Herlihy
Assistant Director: Steve Bagnara
Director of Photography: Jordan Ritz
Set Design: Eamonn McGlynn
Sound Tech: Johnny Karlsson
FOH/Broadcast Engineer: Paul Hager
TINY DESK TEAM
Producers: Bob Boilen, Bobby Carter
Video Producer: Morgan Noelle Smith
Audio Mastering: Josh Rogosin
Tiny Production Team: Kara Frame, Maia Stern
Executive Producer: Lauren Onkey
Senior VP, Programming: Anya Grundmann