The National’s Matt Berninger Announces Second Solo Album
The seminal rock group's frontman releases his new album on May 30. We’re getting a first taste of what to expect with the lead single “Bonnet of Pins.”
Photo by Chantal Anderson
May 30 is going to be one hell of a day for music this year. Besides upcoming albums from Ty Segall (just announced today), Garbage, yeule and Ben Kweller being released that Friday, The National’s lead vocalist and lyricist Matt Berninger is joining the fray with his sophomore record Get Sunk, out via Book/Concord Records. We’re getting a first taste of what to expect with the lead single “Bonnet of Pins.”
Berninger co-wrote a number of the songs on Get Sunk with the album’s producer and engineer Sean O’Brien, who has a Grammy thanks to his work on Taylor Swift’s Evermore. Much of the LP was recorded in a basement studio in Silverlake, California with collaborators Meg Duffy (Hand Habits), Julia Laws (Ronboy), Kyle Resnick (The National, Beirut), Garret Lang, Sterling Laws, Booker T Jones, Harrison Whitford, Mike Brewer, and The Walkmen’s Walter Martin and Paul Maroon. Get Sunk is, in part, how our identities are shaped by all the people who touch our lives, from our parents to random acquaintances, so the large cast of contributors feels appropriate.
Paste writer Candace McDuffie praised Berninger’s debut solo effort, Serpentine Prison (2020), writing that the album “displays infinite promise from an artist who has already given us a catalogue that has made a lasting impact on rock music as we know it.” With “Bonnet of Pins,” Berninger lives up to that expectation; the song boasts the lived-in texture of a Neil Young song, but delivered with a rush of rock fervor that sits distinctly in The National’s sonic palette. Beaming, arena-ready guitar shines even brighter thanks to spacious synths, bringing light to the narrator’s somewhat dark vignette about encountering an old flame. “Never thought I’d ever see her here / Never thought I’d see her again,” Berninger intones wistfully. He recounts their exchange on the chorus, their conversation brought to life by the addition of a female vocalist. As melancholic as the lyrics can be (“The closest thing she’s ever found to love / is the kind you can’t get rid of fast enough”), this expansive stadium rock moment exposes the seemingly small stories of normal people as the emotional epics they really are.
Listen to “Bonnet of Pins” below and, further down, check out the Get Sunk album art and tracklist, as well as Berninger’s upcoming tour dates. And enjoy some vintage National at the very end of the article with their 2007 Daytrotter session.
