The National’s Matt Berninger on struggling with writer’s block: “Everything was evidence of failure”
The National’s Matt Berninger has opened up about struggling with writer’s block.
It comes after ‘Laugh Track’, the band’s surprise ninth album arrived in quick succession off the back of April’s acclaimed ‘First Two Pages of Frankenstein’. It was announced earlier this month (September 15) during a concert at their Homecoming Festival in Cincinnati, Ohio. The LP was released three days later on September 18.
Speaking to The Independent, Berninger reflected on having writer’s block for some time, a process that he said would scare him.
“I couldn’t even open a laptop,” he told the publication. “I could barely pick up my phone. Everything symbolised my paralysis. Everything was evidence of failure. So once it started coming back, I thought: I have to keep writing.”
Now, Berninger says he’s protective of his writing time saying that he finds time daily to write. “I go to bed knowing OK there’s still some ink in there, in the well,” he added.
He also revealed that part of his writing process involves sending messages to himself. “I don’t know why I text myself,” he explained. “But it has become such a fluid way of catching the leaves as they fall. Even reaching over and grabbing a notebook by the side of the bed and turning on a light to write it down, I’m going to lose whatever it was.
“I’ve written myself more texts than anybody else…More than my wife! Soon I’ll have to ghost myself,” he joked.
Meanwhile, the band’s Aaron Dessner recently opened up to Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe about their new album ‘Laugh Track’.
“It’s always like this special moment when you realise it’s bouncing off people and it’s cathartic in people’s lives and just songs take on a much different, they always surprise us,” Dessner told Lowe.
He continued: “The life that a song has is unpredictable and that’s the best part of making music, I think, is seeing where it goes. …I’m also thinking you’ve learned how to deal with anxiety and the suffering that’s in your thoughts better and you start to be able to be more in the moment with the process.
“I think we also have been playing really well live all of a sudden. I think these are best shows that we’ve ever played. The whole thing just feels, it feels like a new chapter. I know maybe we say that every time, but this time I really mean it.”
‘Laugh Track’ features various collaborations from Bon Iver on ‘Weird Goodbyes’, Rosanne Cash (daughter of Johnny Cash) on ‘Crumble’ and Phoebe Bridgers on the title track.
In a four-star review of ‘Laugh Track’, NME shared: “The tightness of ‘First Two Pages…’’s singles like ‘Tropic Morning News’ and ‘Eucalyptus’ are somewhat absent, though the looser structures and decision to allow the songs room to grow, melodically and lyrically pays off. In a statement shared with the record, Berninger says the period ‘feels like the shedding of a skin’ and the band walk into the unknown once again for their next creative cycle: a thrilling new chapter will surely emerge.”
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Elizabeth Aubrey
NME
