A National Anthem: Langerado’s Lovely Ending

By Julia Reidy

We actually ran across the bumpy fields to get there, arms full of magazines, backpacks bouncing, gasping for air. We’d just closed up the Paste tent and refused to miss what, for us, would be Langerado’s finale—and, for me, the weekend’s highlight.

The last time slot at the Chickee Hut (or, as we affectionately began to call it, the “Hipster Hut") belonged, inevitably, fortuitously, to the six individuals who created Paste‘s favorite album of 2007. After Of Montreal vacated the now shaving-cream-flecked stage, The National calmly soundchecked and tuned their own instruments, all dressed in dark colors—grays, denim, stripes. They seemed perfect foils for the dazzling visual spectacle the stage had just hosted, but no less brilliant.

Apparently unfazed by their status as the only act scheduled against Phil Lesh and Friends on the festival’s main stage (and by souvenirs from the previous act that somehow found their way onto frontman Matt Berninger’s clothes), The National played to the respectably-sized crowd that had decided, at least initially, in favor of artful indie rock.

The National didn’t disappoint. Though the Cincinatti-begotten band deceptively emanates humility, the prowess they display on their instruments and in their very songcraft is truly intimidating. They morphed their precision-filled recorded songs (several from Boxer, several from older releases), packed to the gills with immaculately placed counterpoint and minute lyrical observations, into transcendent live rock-outs. Like sculptors, they chiseled the songs in sharp relief, introducing parts gradually, building tension, pulling audience members to the tips of their toes, stomachs clenched in anticipation. Berninger’s baritone voice hits low, in the abdomen, pulling you from your insides into the emotion he communicates so compellingly.

The set opened quietly with Boxer‘s “Start A War.” Berninger immediately began to weave his lyrical tapestry; images of frailty and nostalgia began to float from the stage amidst the light fog with the line, “I have never had to hold you by the edges like I do now.” The brothers Dessner, Aaron and Bryce, flanked him on either side with their dueting guitar lines. The song escalated dramatically into a cacophony of organized chaos, heavily assisted by multi-instrumentalist Padma Newsome sawing on his violin and crawling all over the keys laid out around him (he also occasionally strummed the violin like a guitar). Everything the band played that night, though much louder and harder-hitting, was no less controlled than on their records. These guys know exactly what they’re doing; they’re surgeons with instruments for scalpels, Scott Devendorf on moving, fuzzy bass, his brother Bryan pumping out the feverish drumming that feels like a racing heartbeat. Together, they kept the visceral momentum rolling relentlessly forward.

When the band reached the one-two-punch of “Apartment Story” and “Fake Empire,” the two most popular tracks from Boxer, it seemed that this must be the show’s pinnacle. They introduced parts one by one during “Apartment Story,” not reaching full effect until the words “So worry not/All things are well.” The chorus soared, vocal harmonies as strong as Berninger’s lead, a striking difference from the album version, and a positive one. It was beautiful, and when followed by the pushing 3 against 4 counterpoint piano of “Fake Empire,” it seemed unimaginable that more could be given by these six to the overwhelmed crowd.

Near the end of the set, however, Berninger led into “Mr. November” from 2005’s Alligator with the words “This is nothing like it was in my room,” and his voice rose higher than it had to that point. The performance reached its true climax as he bent, tensed, around his microphone, the one he’d ripped from its stand with a glare earlier, doubled over. Then he reached the song’s refrain, screaming “I won’t fuck us over, I’m Mr. November/I’m Mr. November, I won’t fuck us over!” and leapt from the stage, climbing the barrier, leaning into the crowd, whose hands, many of which were still flecked with Kevin Barnes’s shaving cream, reached toward him and high into the air. We were left as breathless walking away from The National as we’d been sprinting toward them.