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MATT BERNINGER

Matt Berninger

Get Sunk

    'Get Sunk' is an ode to the infinite. It brings brush-stroked, blurry memories to the surface, amassing in a heap of colors and connections that stretches beyond individuality and into an endless altering. Under water, everything moves in slow motion and for Matt Berninger, he saw his creative voice slipping away with the current. But sometimes we have to drown to remember how to breathe. 'Get Sunk' is the purgative inhale. It’s seeing the undulating reflection in the water and realizing that you are not yourself without a thousand others: parents, friends, siblings, spouses and exes, college roommates, childhood best friends, cousins and kids, strangers even––all of it––make up the spirit of 'Get Sunk’s narrator. Berninger wanted to figure out why he loves what he does and it’s in the album’s collaborative spirit and loose, unfurling attitude that Berninger looked up and felt the warmth on his face. When we sink into ourselves, we’ll often find that we are actually swimming with others. 

    STAFF COMMENTS

    Barry says: Matt Berninger finds his latest LP draped in the sort of thoughtful solemnity we find in the work of his parent band, but 'Get Sunk' has reaped the sonic benefits from crackly, saturated drift and staggered syncopated wooze.

    TRACK LISTING

    1. Inland Ocean
    2. No Love
    3. Bonnet Of Pins
    4. Frozen Oranges
    5. Breaking Into Acting Feat. Hand Habits
    6. Nowhere Special
    7. Little By Little
    8. Junk
    9. Silver Jeep Feat. Ronboy
    10. Times Of Difficulty 

    Matt Berninger

    Serpentine Prison

      Serpentine Prison is the debut solo record from Matt Berninger front man of The National. The album, produced by renowned Memphis multi-instrumentalist Booker T. Jones (of Booker T. & The MG’s fame) will be released via Book Records, a new imprint formed by Berninger and Jones in conjunction with Concord Records.

      “The song ‘Serpentine Prison’ was written in December 2018, about a week after recording The National’s I Am Easy to Find,” Berninger explains about the new track. “For a long time, I had been writing songs for movies and musicals and other projects where I needed to get inside someone else’s head and convey another person’s feelings. I liked doing that, but I was ready to dig back into my own garbage and this was the first thing that came out.”

      Berninger continues, “The title is from a twisting sewer pipe that drains into the ocean near LAX. There’s a cage on the pipe to keep people from climbing out to sea. I worked on the song with Sean O’Brien and Harrison Whitford and recorded it about six months later with Booker T. Jones producing. It feels like an epilogue, so I named the record after it and put it last.”

      The album features contributions from a wide array of notable artists, including Matt Barrick (The Walkmen, Jonathan Fire*Eater), Andrew Bird, Mike Brewer, Hayden Desser, Scott Devendorf (The National), Gail Ann Dorsey (David Bowie, Lenny Kravitz), Booker T. Jones, Teddy Jones, Brent Knopf (EL VY, Menomena), Ben Lanz (The National, Beirut), Walter Martin (The Walkmen, Jonathan Fire*Eater), Sean O'Brien, Mickey Raphael (Willie Nelson, Bob Dylan), Kyle Resnick (The National, Beirut), Matt Sheehy (EL VY, Lost Lander) and Harrison Whitford (Phoebe Bridgers). Additional production on the album was provided by Sean O’Brien.


      STAFF COMMENTS

      Barry says: Matt Berninger has had our attention for a long time, fronting and writing songs for The National. It comes as a little surprise then, that he's smashed out a solo album with the band still fully intact (just not the done thing is it?). Anyway, he's forgiven because what we have here is a beautifully emotive but comfortingly different creative path than his 'Day Job'. How the songs keep flowing at this quality is beyond me, let's just hope they keep flowing.

      TRACK LISTING

      1. My Eyes Are T-Shirts
      2. Distant Axis
      3. One More Second
      4. Loved So Little
      5. Silver Springs
      6. Oh Dearie
      7. Take Me Out Of Town
      8. Collar Of Your Shirt
      9. All For Nothing
      10. Serpentine Prison


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