New Music - The National, "Fake Empire"

The National have released the first song from Boxer, the new record hitting stores May 22 via Beggars. “Fake Empire” presents slight tweaks to the National’s sound we’ve become accustomed to through their awe-inspiring 2005 release, Alligator. Beginning with a simple-enough piano progression and Matt Berninger’s rich baritone crooning about spiking his lemonade and hitting the “shiny city” in his “diamond slippers”, Berninger seems discontented, “half asleep in the fake empire”. He remains calm, maybe somewhat detached, even after those drums slide in (damn, Bryan Devendorf is good!) and the song picks up considerably. He’s hiding somewhere between the piano and bass, seemingly uninterested if you can fully make out his words or not, in stark contrast to his “hey, listen to me” vocals which rode high above the music on Alligator. The track is augmented by horns, and evolves into a full band romp that never quite loses control like it teases it might.
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MP3 :: Fake Empire
(from Boxer)

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