simon i have a feeling you’ll like this the more you spend time with it. it wasn’t billed as a double album but it works like one: the songs talk to each other, and it works itself into weird subspaces. oddly i think watching the movie is a way in too, it enriches specific lyrics
― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, 15 May 2019 11:07 (four years ago) link
i will say the album is more ballad-forward than i expected or hoped but i’ve already adjusted
― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, 15 May 2019 11:08 (four years ago) link
yeah same
the only real dud for me is Rylan which i know is apparently a fan favourite because it's been floating around for 8 years or something but it's still them at their most middle-of-the-road even though the arrangement is a lot better than it would have been a decade ago
― ufo, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 11:49 (four years ago) link
I think the album is a bundle of good contradictions. It's not really a double album but feels like one, it's ballad heavy but not necessarily chill, it's got some of Matt's best lyrics and singing but he often takes a back seat to other singers and singing, it's got some pretty jarring experimental elements but it's totally MOR. And so on.
Oh, and needless to say, the drumming is incredible.
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 11:52 (four years ago) link
i love every lyric and sound in "quiet light"
― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:14 (four years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S37thEwlWPA
good performance of "you had your soul with you", with string section and second drummer (no gail ann dorsey though)
― ufo, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:17 (four years ago) link
learning how not to cry every time there's another sad unbearable morningbut sometimes there's nothing i can doi can't help it
― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:17 (four years ago) link
the drumming on "quiet light" is brilliant, bryan devendorf seems to get better with every album somehow
― ufo, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:23 (four years ago) link
So these guys are definitely going all-in on everything - strings, singers, horns, etc. - for this tour?
― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:49 (four years ago) link
they've had a horn section forever but idk whether the strings etc. are sticking around for the tour or are only around for the run of album/film premiere dates they've been doing over the last month
― ufo, Wednesday, 15 May 2019 12:54 (four years ago) link
wow i REALLY love this album
― american bradass (BradNelson), Wednesday, 15 May 2019 23:09 (four years ago) link
https://www.nme.com/news/national-rockier-songs-leftover-may-get-freezer-2488317
apparently they've got a bunch of rockier material left over from the Sleep Well Beast sessions that didn't make this album either since it didn't fit the mood of the film etc. so i hope that'll be more "the system only dreams"/"you had your soul with you" than "turtleneck" whenever it sees the light of day
― ufo, Thursday, 16 May 2019 05:41 (four years ago) link
The contemporary classical bent of whichever one of the brothers is into that stuff really pays off on this album's arrangements.
That is Bryce! His own chamber music is def worth checking out
― flamboyant goon tie included, Thursday, 16 May 2019 12:07 (four years ago) link
it's the way that you're going to stop needing to tell me you want me as much as i want you to
― american bradass (BradNelson), Thursday, 16 May 2019 15:56 (four years ago) link
Their best album.
― recriminations from the nitpicking woke (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 16 May 2019 16:21 (four years ago) link
yep
― american bradass (BradNelson), Thursday, 16 May 2019 16:22 (four years ago) link
I've never top tenned one of their albums before.
― recriminations from the nitpicking woke (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 16 May 2019 16:24 (four years ago) link
me neither, and it usually takes me a while to figure out how i feel about them, cf. the album this thread is named after
― american bradass (BradNelson), Thursday, 16 May 2019 16:25 (four years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbXnnn8z1tE
i get why people would dismiss "rylan," feels like it's borrowed most of its rumble from "apartment story" to create the most national national song ever, but... it's so catchy
― american bradass (BradNelson), Thursday, 16 May 2019 18:47 (four years ago) link
I just thought of perfect "feat. female guest singer" example that kind of pulls off what this album does: "My Curse," by fellow (can it be a coincidence?) Cincinnati sons Afghan Whigs.
Also, maybe "You're Still Standing There" by Steve Earle, when previously more or less AWOL Lucinda Williams suddenly pops up.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 17 May 2019 15:13 (four years ago) link
I didn't realize that the album was made in such close collaboration with Mike Mills, who even produced. Has he produced anything else?
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 17 May 2019 15:17 (four years ago) link
Marcy Mays on "My Curse" feels to me like much more direct and successful attempt at a counterpoint/perspective change than anything here.
― Simon H., Friday, 17 May 2019 15:19 (four years ago) link
anyway I can already tell this is going to be yet another one of those albums where I stick to listening to my own resequence/edit and get a lot more out of it that way
― Simon H., Friday, 17 May 2019 15:21 (four years ago) link
i made a thread: thread for i am easy to find, the 2019 album by the national and film by mike mills
― american bradass (BradNelson), Friday, 17 May 2019 16:25 (four years ago) link
There are lots of candidates, but this really is the best album by them, isn't it? So sad and pretty.
― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, 20 May 2023 22:29 (eleven months ago) link
it is
― poster of sparks (rogermexico.), Saturday, 20 May 2023 23:32 (eleven months ago) link
This is by far my favourite album of theirs. There's real sadness but also exaggerated sadness (played for humour, I think?), similar to what Tindersticks used to do. It's a perfect balance that they haven't managed to duplicate since.
― NoTimeBeforeTime, Sunday, 21 May 2023 14:06 (eleven months ago) link