“Get drunk! Get sunk! Forget! Get wet!” Matt Berninger in “Times of Difficulty” suggests these strategies as problem solutions. It is a stoic piece of music, in which, apart from the piano and tenderly dinging electric guitar, not much happens until the song becomes a kind of gospel at some point. And with the request to sink, it also gives the second solo album of the National front man the title.
Why did he choose this trade instruction to paraphrase the whole album? Perhaps because sinking is actually a more soul. So get Sunk circles the topic of identity and all the emotional entanglements that shape us. The driving force of his work with The National sucht Berninger is not necessarily.
Instead, he lets himself go through a musical swamp area with a guest list that extends from hand to Kyle Resnick to Booker T. Jones that clouds the furor of his main band somewhat, but does not explore the great adventures stylistically. Sometimes small candles flicker, such as the enchanting background vocals by Julia Laws in “Bonnets of Pins” or the strange flirting in the near-waltz “Breaking into Acting”. However, a lot is blurred, blurred, almost united, but not unhappy. Because if you live in these songs long enough, you understand them differently, maybe than: sketchbook.
You can find out which albums were still published in May 2025 via our monthly publication list.