Sometimes a song embraces you on the very first listen. Maybe it’s the melody. Maybe it’s the lyrics. Maybe it’s the voice. And, maybe it’s that rare thing where it’s all three at the same time, much like Fleetwood Mac’s Dreams, just to name one of a few, which was so very compelling from the first moment I heard it. Do you have a song like that? One that hit you right away?

Weird Goodbyes by The National ft Bon Iver is one of those songs for me. Despite the fact that it’s been out since September, I just heard it a couple of weeks ago–Alexa, what is this song?

Matt Berninger’s voice reminds me of a young Tom Rush and Leonard Cohen, if you smooshed their voices together. I am such a sucker for those baritone sounds, which seem so infrequent in popular music. Add the words that sound like poetry to me mingled with grief and memories and the melody that just enhances those elements–and I am indeed a goner.

Give this a listen and tell me what you think.

It finally hits me, a mile’s drive
The sky is leaking, my windshield’s crying
I’m feeling sacred, my soul is stripped
Radio’s painful, the words are clipped
The grief, it gets me, the weird goodbyes
My car is creepin’, I think it’s dying
I’m pullin’ over until it heals
I’m on a shoulder of lemon fields

Songwriters: Aaron Brooking Dessner / Matt Berninger

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