Balloonerism”>
Mac Miller’s Estate/Warner Records
In 2013, as the late rapper Mac Miller was recording his album Watching Movies With The Sound Off, the project that’d propel him into the hip-hop mainstream, he also began working on a project titled Balloonerism. Now, over a decade later, the album has been officially released as Miller’s second posthumous project, following Circles in 2020. It arrived with a companion short film on Prime Video.
The 14 songs on the record deal heavily with his struggles with mental health and substance abuse, and were largely recorded between 2013 and 2014, a low period of his life. Since its release, fans have gravitated toward several key lyrics from the album, which appear to show Miller’s thoughts around death, dying young, as well as his inner conflicts with his drug addictions. For example, “Funny Papers” includes the line, “Didn’t think anybody died on a Friday,” which fans have found tragically ironic considering news of Miller’s death broke on a Friday.
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On September 7, 2018, Miller was found fatally overdosed at his San Fernando home; he was 26.
Below, we break down 10 important lyrics from Balloonerism.
“Yeah, somebody died today/ I saw his pictures in the funny papers/ Didn’t think anybody died on a Friday” — “Funny Papers”
As fans have pointed out on social media, a tragic irony about this lyric is that Miller passed away on September 7, 2018, which was a Friday.
“You wonder when God will just listen and give you a break/ And He says, ‘See, living and dying are one and the same’” — “Tomorrow Will Never Know”
As the 11-minute closing track of Balloonerism, “Tomorrow Will Never Know” shows the introspective side of Miller as he raps abstractly about his dreams and starting over. According to a 2013 interview with hardknocktv, Miller wrote the song in 2013 and said he’d been “listening to it to go to sleep every night.”
“‘Cause I see the light at the end of the tunnel/ It feels like I’m dyin’, dyin’/ , dyin’ I’m dead” — “Manakin”
Leaked online in 2020, “Manakin” is the penultimate song of Balloonerism and might be the darkest. On it, the rapper speaks frankly about his “bad days.”
“Okay, I went to sleep famous and I woke up invisible Rich as fuck and miserable At least I did Kimmel and Arsenio, my mom got it on video That’s the shit I live for, all this other shit is trivial (One, two, go)” — “Do You Have A Destination?”
Recorded in 2014, the most recently made song on Balloonerism per Genius, “Do You Have A Destination” continues the record’s themes of introspective wandering and includes him actively reflecting on the milestones of his career.
“Let me give you what you want/ And maybe later, what you need” — “5 Dollar Pony Rides”
“5 Dollar Pony Rides” is the lead single of Balloonerism and has long been an unreleased fan-favorite deep-cut. It was finally officially released at the top of 2025, and finds Miller singing to an unnamed girl who keeps missing Miller’s hints about wanting to be something more.
“Still wide awake, I’m a stranger to the daytime/ Vampire, higher than a hang glider” — “Friendly Hallucinations”
As a whole Balloonerism is an intimate look into Miller’s psyche and struggles; “Friendly Hallucinations,” which features backing vocals from SZA, bass and production from Thundercat, and a Big Daddy Kane sample, looks at Miller’s relationship with drugs.
“Started smokin’ weed again, started tryna read again/ Clean myself up, now would you be my friend?” — “Mrs. Deborah Downer”
On “Mrs. Deborah Downer,” Miller continues to weigh the pros and cons of his substance abuse addiction, illustrating a strong inner conflict.
“If I die young, promise to smile at my funeral/ Yeah, it’s just a rule to follow” — “Shangri-La”
Along with “Funny Papers” and “Manakin,” fans have pointed to “Shangri-La” as another eerily prescient track on Balloonerism. Its title, fans also theorize, could be a reference to Rick Rubin’s Shangri-La recording studios in Malibu, which Miller used to frequent.
“I swear to God/ Heaven feels just like home” — “Stoned”
Produced by Miller himself under his producer pseudonym Larry Fisherman, “Stoned” finds Miller singing to an unknown girl about getting high, which he compares to heaven, with her.
“Uh, Josh/ Knock, knock/ Rick Rubin/ Rick Rubin’s piano” — “Rick’s Piano”
According to Miller’s engineer Josh Berg, Miller recorded this song in 2014 during a period of time when he was staying at Rick Rubin’s home in Malibu to try and get clean. “I’d just go to Rick’s house every day and just sit and play the keyboard,” Miller said of that time in an interview with Grantland. “Before then, I never really played music unless I was recording it.” “Rick’s Piano” is a song that came from that period of time.
