The National’s Matt Berninger announces new solo album, ‘Get Sunk’
The National frontman Matt Berninger has announced details of his second solo album, Get Sunk, and shared the lead single, ‘Bonnet of Pins’.
The upcoming record is the follow-up to his 2020 debut, Serpentine Prison, and comes off the back of a prolific period for The National. In 2023, the influential indie band released two albums, First Two Pages of Frankenstein and Laugh Track, which was followed by an extensive world tour that included a headline slot on The Other Stage at Glastonbury.
However, while it seems like Berninger is an unstoppable force of creativity currently, the same couldn’t be said in 2020 when he was struck by writer’s block. Looking back five years later, he describes it as “a long period of writer’s block and self-disgust. I just got sick of asking myself ‘Why am I like this?’”
It’s a theme which he visits on Get Sunk as he dealt with the sinking loss of his creative voice and found himself deep underwater. The press material also states of the album’s message: “It’s about realizing that you are not yourself without a thousand others: parents, friends, siblings, spouses and exes, college roommates, childhood best friends, cousins, kids and even strangers.”
The album was worked on alongside Grammy Award-winning producer Sean O’Brien and features musicians including 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 set for release on May 30th through Book/Concord Records. To celebrate its arrival, Berninger will be playing a series of shows across North America prior to its release.
In August, The National frontman will arrive in the United Kingdom and Ireland for a series of shows, including headline dates in Dublin, London, Manchester, and Glasgow before appearing at End of the Road. The jaunt will then move into mainland Europe to visit the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Norway and Denmark.
Matt Berninger – Get Sunk tracklist:
- ‘Inland Ocean’
- ‘No Love’
- ‘Bonnet of Pins’
- ‘Frozen Oranges’
- ‘Breaking Into Acting’ (feat. Hand Habits)
- ‘Nowhere Special’
- ‘Little by Little’
- ‘Junk’
- ‘Silver Jeep’ (feat. Ronboy)
- ‘Times of Difficulty’
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