Virus diary: Week 13

It feels like the wheels have come off this lockdown – all the good bits, like the lack of traffic and people looking out for each other, seem to be reverting back to type.

And the bad bits, businesses closing and millions of people facing uncertain futures, are about to get a lot worse. At least fewer and fewer people are getting sick or dying – but without a vaccine or cure is it just a matter of time before that reverts too?

And nobody is really sure what they are supposed to be doing. They’re meeting friends in parks or walking the streets in socially distant clusters. At some point the Covid-19 numbers will either start to get worse or just fade away to leave us wondering what the hell just happened.

Meanwhile, the news agenda has moved on to the Black Lives Matters protests, and statues being pulled down, and suddenly we find ourselves shielding the kids from the news in a way we hadn’t since the coronavirus took hold. We don’t want to have to explain racism and slavery to a six-year-old who literally doesn’t notice the most obvious ways in which some of his friends are different. But with music, much of the best stuff is fused by politics so it’s difficult to avoid. From Hey Joe “Where is he going with that gun in his hand, dad?” to Strange Fruit, from What’s Going On to This Is America, black music has always been politically charged – it had to be. It’s just a shame the millions upon millions of white people who dug it didn’t notice or just nodded along but didn’t bother to do anything. Maybe this time we will.

The revolution will not be televised, funk poet Gil Scott Heron once proclaimed. He was wrong – it’ll be on 24/7 until the news agenda shifts again and people head out again, meeting in parks or walking the streets in their raciallydistant clusters.

All things being equal we would have enjoyed our first big outdoor show of the summer last weekend. Well, the first big decent outdoor show, any road.

The National headlining Live At Botanic Gardens would have been by far their biggest gig in NI to date. Incomparably huge down south, the Ohio five-piece have somehow managed to maintain a lower profile this side of the border, playing more regularly in the likes of the Mandela Hall and venues of similar size.

Quite why the band are so low-key remains a mystery to us. Despite years of touring, headlining festivals and releasing albums of genuine gold, they still remain one of those word-of-mouth bands that creep up on you, delightfully with a ready-made back catalogue of astounding songs.

Formed in 1999 by a group of friends, their first self-titled album was released in 2001 and they’ve been on the march together ever since. Those two decades have produced eight albums and 101 songs (yes we counted them) - quite the daunting journey if you’re new to The National and you’re curious to explore more (which you absolutely should be).

So here’s our guide on where to start your love affair with one of the very finest bands in the world today..

The band’s third album proper, Alligator, garnered huge critical acclaim and brought the band to the general psyche of the indie rock world. With blissful odes to love won and lost and tales of erroneous, misspent evenings, all underpinned by the band’s trademark military drum rhythms, deliciously layered melody, and lead singer Matt Berninger’s distinctive, Nick Caveesque baritone, it was quickly acknowledged as one of the finest releases of the year, topping The LA Times, The Onion and Billboard’s year end music lists.

Baby We’ll Be Fine, Secret Meeting, Looking For Astronauts

Their fourth album,

Boxer, remains one of the most magical and complete LP’S of modern times. Filled with joy, heartache and the most magnificent musical arrangement you’ll hear. It’s a 12-track work of indie genius that will light up your life.

With little fanfare, the band played this album from back to front at a Brussels show in 2017, and released the recording as a collector’s edition LP on Record Store Day 2018.

The whole album. A masterpiece from start to finish.

Ask any dyed-inthe-wool National fan what their favourite album and more often than not it will be a toss up between Boxer and 2010’s follow up High Violet. Two records of equal marvel, brimming with the band’s unmistakable soaring melancholic keys, choruses and perfectly written lyrics. Sorrow, the album’s second song, is one of the most perfect three minutes of music you will hear anywhere.

The whole album. A(nother) masterpiece from start to finish.

Album number seven and Rolling Stone’s favourite; “Some will fault the National for not evolving their sound more radically, or speaking more explicitly to the political moment. But Sleep Well Beast is what it is: an emotional battlefield, beautifully drawn, familiar and true. Berninger voices a panicked, depressive insomniac who might be any of us, trying to hold it together while everything falls apart.”

Carin At The Liquor Store, Guilty Party, The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness

Don’t Swallow The Cap and I Need My Girl (Trouble Will Find Me, 2013) INMG is one of the band’s highest streamed songs on Spotify and a stone cold classic; Light Years (I Am Easy To Find, 2019); American Mary (The National, 2001); About Today (Cherry Tree EP, 2004).

REVOLUTIONARY Gil Scott Heron