LONG LIVE MAC MILLER YEARS AFTER HIS DEATH, I FINALLY GET WHAT MAC MILLER WAS SAYING

A REDISCOVERY OF HIS WORK SHOWS HOW HIS CATALOG HAS GROWN INTO A LIVING ARCHIVE OF VULNERABILITY AND HOPE

- By PEONY HIRWANI

I didn’t sit down to write this.

I sat down to listen. I put Mac Miller on shuffle with no plan or angle, and somewhere between K.I.D.S. and Swimming, it hit me: I had been underestimating just how much he carried. Years after his passing, the records don’t feel archived; they feel present, as if they’ve grown up alongside me and now speak back with renewed patience and clarity. That’s why I’m writing this — because revisiting his catalog tonight reminded me how rare it is for an artist to make you feel understood this steadily, this long after they’re gone.

Mac Miller, born Malcolm James McCormick, died on Sep. 7, 2018, at just 26 years old. He was found unresponsive at his Los Angeles home, and the coroner later confirmed his death as an accidental overdose from fentanyl, cocaine, and alcohol. The news was sudden and devastating, a moment that froze the music world in grief. In the years since, details of counterfeit pills and criminal cases have only underscored the senselessness of the loss. But beyond the headlines, what remains is the music — and the feeling that it still grows with you.