Apr

23

Initial thoughts on High Violet

Filed Under news 

In anticipation of its May 11 release and to counter the murky-sounding leak now dribbling ’round internet, the National is streaming their upcoming LP High Violet on the New York Times website until April 27th. Accompanying the higher-quality stream is a pretty fine article by one Nicholas Dawidoff, who follows the tumult the band goes through in composing a song called “Lemonworld”. Either item is well worth a click on that link up there.

Sites like Ripfork—and my own experience doing so—have amply convinced me that writing about music is a perilous affair, so no hyphen-heavy pontification on the record’s sound or what’s at stake for the band or blah blah blah. Just three things, conveyed after one go-round with High Violet.

One: The record fits the National’s pattern (at least since Alligator) of gathering songs onto LPs that add up to more than the sum of their parts… put another way, this is an album, not 11 songs by the National.

Two: Matt Berninger is a real sad-sack. The songs fit together lyrically and musically, not least because the dude can’t stop singing about how sad everything is (even though Obama—his name be praised—now presides over this Fake Empire of ours!). His sorrow and anguish are rather exhausting. Fortunately, the music sounds like it’s really worth digging into.

Three: No drop-dead, staggering, perpetually-surprising standouts like Boxer‘s “Fake Empire”, and no outright stinkers… this often indicates a completely mediocre record. I think it means people will either like or dislike the entire thing.

Here’s Afraid of Everyone, which has been making the rounds already. I must say, it sounds even better where it belongs—between “Little Faith” and “Bloodbuzz, Ohio”.

Like the article? Subscribe to the Stereopathic RSS Feed

Comments

2 Responses to “Initial thoughts on High Violet”

  1. larson on April 23rd, 2010 1:33 pm

    Who wrote this?! Great work!

  2. Corey on June 16th, 2010 10:03 pm

    I think this album is not even close to mediocre. I definately think it is their greatest album to date.

Leave a Reply




Or...