The National — ahead of their upcoming album, First Two Pages Of Frankenstein, arriving later this month — have shared the final preview song from the album. “Your Mind Is Not Your Friend,” a collaboration with Phoebe Bridgers, is a twinkling and somber take on the struggles of mental health.
“Don’t you understand? / Your mind is not your friend again / It takes you by the hand/ And leaves you nowhere,” Matt Berninger sings.
“When I feel stuck, I’ll often grab a book off the shelf just to get some words in my head, and the first two pages of Frankenstein ended up triggering ‘Your Mind Is Not Your Friend,’” he added in a statement about the song’s inspiration. “The book starts off with the narrator on a voyage near the Arctic Circle, and that image of being adrift helped me to write about feeling disconnected and lost and lacking in purpose. Once I started confronting that strange, blurry panic of not having ideas, everything began to crack open a bit.”
The music video for the track was directed by Phoebe’s brother Jackson. And, keeping with the nature of the song, The National is donating to TinyChanges, the charity created to honor Frightened Rabbits’ Scott Hutchinson.
“Scott made tiny changes that had a big impact,” the charity’s website reads. “His honesty and openness about his own mental health inspired people from all walks of life.”
Check out The National’s “Your Mind Is Not Your Friend” with Phoebe Bridgers above.
First Two Pages Of Frankenstein is out 4/28 via 4AD. Find more information here.