New Music: The National

In many ways, High Violent picks up where Boxer left off. Musically, the band is at the top of its game: very conscious of atmosphere and mood, offering spacious settings for Matt Berninger's tortured ballads (the guitar flourishes, the brass horns, the driving jungle beats, and the choral backdrop of "Afraid of Everyone" are pitch perfect). Berninger has never sounded more in love with his melancholy and normally I'd consider this much brooding a bit tiresome. But, as Berninger has demonstrated over and over, he knows how to wear his misery. "Sorrow" is particularly depressing, as Berninger lists each possible avenue (his body, his honey, his milk) as a source of heartache. I just wish I could give him a hug. Especially after a song like "Lemonworld," which follows former soldier who escapes the city to visit his estranged children.

It may sound trite, but I'm quite impressed with the way he's been able to harness and channel his sadness. Berninger shows no signs of letting up. Nor do the melodies. High Violet is more accessible, more anthemic, more consistently upbeat and hook-driven than Alligator, perhaps even more than Boxer. It's commendable that The National can make such a solid album of new material and retain such a familiar sound, but you have to wonder how long this can last. As long as Berninger's songwriting is this strong, I guess, there's no reason to worry. "Bloodbuzz Ohio," which falls somewhere between biblical allegory and confession, and the piano-based "England," an epic slow-builder with lush orchestration and a triumphant swell of catharsis (this late in the album, I think we deserve it), are probably the album's most fully realized tracks, possibly The National's best yet. And I could go on. There really aren't any duds here. My only real criticism is that Berninger's vocal delivery is too one-dimensional, but things get better towards the end of the album, with "England" and especially "Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks" (the closest thing The National have ever done to a feel good sing-along).

Berninger is quite up front about his angst (still undeniably an urban kind of angst, where the social realm always ends up being tragically alienating); actually, the mood and aesthetic remind me of Mad Men. Don Draper and Berninger seem to be working through the same sorts of demons. I think Don would appreciate High Violet; well, at least he'd know how to sell it.

Betty Draper like she used to be

Mad Men's January Jones is basically playing her character from the series on this SNL digital short. The clip has exactly the same substance of an episode of Mad Men but this time around we can all laugh about it. Sort of.

on youth and youngmanhood

I'm sorry to bump U2 from the top of my webpage, but it had to happen at some point. Huge egos are in no short supply. Don Draper, recently named the most iconic man in America (ahead of Obama!), knows how to where a tie - so well, in fact, that he's always tangled up in an affair of some sort, whether it's a businessman looking for a new image for his company, or a girl who can resist his uber-macho charm. Are we really that shallow? I think so.

Don Draper may be a fictional character on AMC's Mad Men, but he's just as real as any other public personality you can think of. Celebrities are brands, with carefully constructed images, and most of us are just as likely to have a beer with Don Draper as with anybody else on this list. What matters is that Draper's hardass 1960s persona represents something about male identity that is enduringly captivating but has nonetheless vanished. The man that Don Draper is -- value-driven and thoroughly masculine -- is the product of a bygone era; without him, there would be no contemporary figure to represent it. Yet, as removed as his persona may be, it is also contemporary and familiar. He's a postwar archetype, both a brilliant career man and a temptation-swayed philanderer who sincerely wants to be a family man. Like most men, us and our fathers both, Draper is permanently conflicted over how to reconcile his morals and his desires.

This from a website that asks their male visitors (creepy) to rate male and female celebrities out of a hundred. I remember when jocks used to do that in high school. No wonder us guys identify with Mr. Draper.

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There are three tracks of sublime pop on the new Atlas Sound record (which comes out tomorrow! and is awesome!). "Sheila" is a catchy, guitar driven anthem about love and death, while the album's heady centrepiece, "Quick Canal," features layered vocal stylings by Stereolab’s Laetitia Sadler. Arguably the weakest of these three, the attention-grabbing "Walkabout," voices the mid-midlife crisis for those of us into our twenties: "what did you want to be when you grew up?" Does growing older have to be a disappointment? The movie everyone is talking about right now (and when I say "everyone" I mean hipster twentysomethings and the websites they visit) is Spike Jones' adaptation of Maurice Sendeck's Where the Wild Things Are. I still haven't seen it but from what I've heard its sounds like its going to appeal to those of us who want our childhood back; those of us who still feel like kids that have been prematurely catapulted into an adult culture of glossy disappointments. I can hear Arcade Fire playing, I can see the "wild" celebration ("inside all of us"), and I'll admit that it makes me nostalgic (even though Karen O and the Kids, who provide the film's soundtrack, really piss me off). It's supposed to, isn't it? Nostalgia allows you get away with anything. It's all right there in Mad Men.