Pitchfork

The National are stuck somewhere in the emotional recesses of life, the characters in their songs adrift on roads both literal and metaphorical. They're stuck between the country and the city, but not in the suburban or exurban senses-- their music reveals the parallels between small-town everybody-knows-everybody drama and big-city alienation. The Brooklyn (via Cincinnati) quintet engage with their American anxiety with a somewhat European elegance, and Alligator-- their third album and first for Beggars Banquet-- finds them pushing the tempos and trying on bigger shoes without losing the stately sense of pacing and dour melody that made their first two albums so pleasing.

Drummer Bryan Devendorf is the backbone of Alligator, his efficient, well-textured timekeeping featuring high in the mix and neatly delineating the band's newfound sense of rhythmic consistency. The music around him moves between lushness and austerity, bursting with chamber pop ornament and collapsing into wasted after-hours reverie. Matt Berninger's dry baritone deadpan is strangely emotional-- at times he almost sounds too tired of life to aim for a high note, and it brings an odd honesty to lines like "I'm sorry for everything." As he repeats the line over the violins and roiling guitars of "Baby, We'll Be Fine", he seems as if he's not only apologizing for everything he's ever done, but also everything that's ever happened that he couldn't control.

The slower, piano-driven death-pop of "Karen" offers some unusual chord progressions as Berninger warns a fading lover: "Whatever you do, listen/ You better wait for me/ No, I wouldn't go out alone into America." "This isn't me, you just haven't seen my good side yet," he tells her, but he's obviously doomed and he grows more desperate as metaphorical black birds circle his bed. On "Lit Up", he grows more confident, even swaggering: "My body guard shows a revolver to anyone who asks" he deadpans gracefully over jagged electric guitars, while his band shouts along for the chorus. The shouted chorus returns for the "Thunder Road"-sized rocker "Abel", the closest the National have come to writing an anthem.

Massed vocals and backing harmonies are two of the few things the National have added to their sound since their last album, and though Alligator is satisfying and engaging, it's not quite as bracing as their stellar sophomore outing, 2003's Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers. Still, the band's nocturnal vision of American pavement and deteriorated personal relations is engrossing, revealing itself slowly, peeling back the luxuriant layers and exposing intricate detail.