Musicians :
Matt Berninger (vocals), Aaron Dessner (guitar, piano, keyboards, percussion, backing vocals), Bryce Dessner (guitar, piano), Scott Devendorf (bass guitar, backing vocals), Bryan Devendorf (drums, percussion), Sufjan Stevens (piano), Thomas Bartlett (keyboards, accordion), Padma Newsome (violin, viola, organ), Ha-Yang Kim (cello), Tim Albright (trombone), CJ Camerieri (trumpet), Jeb Wallace (French horn), Rachael Elliott (bassoon), Sara Phillips (clarinet), Alex Sopp (flute), Carin Besser, Marla Hansen, Pauline de Lassus (vocals, backing vocals).

Avec Boxer, paru en 2007, The National s'impose définitivement comme l'un des groupes les plus influents du XXIᵉ siècle. Porté par la voix grave et singulière de Matt Berninger, l'album déploie un univers riche en émotions, mêlant récits intimistes, écriture littéraire et arrangements d'une élégance rare. Entre tension contenue et mélodies lumineuses, Boxer offre une collection de chansons intemporelles qui ont marqué toute une génération d'amateurs de rock indépendant.

Des titres devenus incontournables tels que "Fake Empire", "Mistaken for Strangers", "Slow Show" ou "Apartment Story" révèlent toute la finesse de la composition du groupe. Chaque morceau se construit avec patience, laissant émerger des atmosphères profondes et captivantes où les détails instrumentaux jouent un rôle essentiel. Cette capacité à conjuguer sophistication musicale et intensité émotionnelle fait de Boxer une œuvre majeure du catalogue de The National.

Cette édition audiophile Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab rend pleinement justice à la richesse de cet album incontournable. Pressé sur deux vinyles 180 grammes en 45 RPM, ce coffret offre une restitution sonore d'une ampleur remarquable, avec une scène sonore plus large, une dynamique accrue et un niveau de détail exceptionnel. Les arrangements subtils, les textures instrumentales et les nuances vocales gagnent en présence et en réalisme, procurant une expérience d'écoute immersive et particulièrement fidèle aux enregistrements originaux.

Strictement limitée à 3000 exemplaires numérotés, cette édition de collection s'adresse aussi bien aux audiophiles exigeants qu'aux admirateurs du groupe. Une réédition de prestige qui permet de redécouvrir l'un des albums les plus importants du rock indépendant moderne dans des conditions sonores exceptionnelles.

- The National Becomes a Preeminent Band of the 21st Century on Boxer : Thematic Album Features Literary Narratives, Simmering Arrangements, and Gorgeous Melodies !

- Experience the 2007 Record in Audiophile Sound : Strictly Limited to 3000 Numbered Copies, Mobile Fidelity’s 180 gram 45 RPM (2 LP) Set Plays with Widescreen Immediacy and Precise Detail !

- 16 bit / 44.1kHz digital master to analog console to lathe !

"Another uninnocent, elegant fall into the unmagnificent lives of adults" : That lyric distills the thematic essence of Boxer, a breakthrough that transformed the National from a respected indie act into one of the 21st century's foremost bands. Replete with literary narratives, widescreen arrangements, and mysterious beauty, the album addresses issues of domesticity, maturation, and escapism with equal parts stark honesty and clever wit. Stately, rich, and intimate, it’s more relevant today than it was upon release in 2007.

Sourced from the original masters, strictly limited to 3000 numbered copies, pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing, and housed in a Stoughton gatefold jacket, Mobile Fidelity's 180 gram 45 RPM (2 LP) set presents Boxer in audiophile sound for the first time. The wider grooves of this exclusive 45 RPM pressing lend to improved tracking, precise detail, and high-frequency preservation.

Distinguished with superb groove definition and ultra-quiet surfaces, the collectible reissue captures the group's chamber textures, rhythmic pacing, brassy accents, and minimalist architecture with immediacy, depth, and balance. Black backgrounds practically place the National on an intimate stage in your listening space. At long last, the airiness, directness, and atmospherics the National generates at its acclaimed live shows can be experienced on record.

And as far as the New York-by-way-of-Cincinnati quintet is concerned, there's no better place to start than Boxer. Not only did it elevate the band's status, it cultivated the members' understanding of one another and, however difficult the journey, developed their chemistry. Faced with the perfectionist tendencies and individual preferences of two sets of brothers, and forced to contend with singer Matt Berninger's unhurried lyric-writing pace, the National forged Boxer out of contention and frustration. The fact the recording process was being chronicled for the documentary film A Skin, A Night likely didn't help matters.

However, in retrospect, it likely did. Boxer is the cohesive, skilled, authoritative work of a fully functioning band whose interpersonal and professional relationships come through in the music. You can hear the evidence in siblings Aaron and Bryce Dessner’s evocative guitar passages and elegant piano lines; in brothers Scott and Bryan Devendorf’s shifting time signatures, jazz-inflected directions, and simmering rhythms; in Berninger’s reserved vocals, repeated phrases, and musky baritone. They all combine to make the impressionistic stories about anxieties, doubts, self-loathing, compromising, pretending, and playing roles all the more real.

As do the tasteful orchestral, brass, and string accents performed by a cast that includes Padma Newsome (violin, viola, organ), Sufjan Stevens (piano), and Thomas Bartlett (keyboards, accordion). The tastefully appointed fanfare works in give-and-take manner with Berninger’s vocals, the moody melodies, and open spaces that signal hesitation, disgust, melancholy, disillusion, complacency. Boxer invites you to step inside dreams that may or may not exist, wander about, and take or leave what you please.

Songs function as cocoons, aural wraps and internal conversations necessary for navigating unrewarding jobs, social pressures, uncertain relationships, and fake empires while holding tight to a shred of dignity. Amid understated soundscapes that remain impossibly gorgeous even if they turn gloomy, protagonists confront situations in which they become unrecognizable to those who know them “Mistaken for Strangers”, sleepwalk through false worlds “Fake Empire”, try to sell themselves on soul-sucking work “Squalor Victoria”, and battle with lovers “Start a War”.

Relief from the tensions, disappointments, and bitter realizations comes from dressing up home situations and bonding with empathetic partners. The warm comfort of “Slow Show”, the reassuring spark of “Apartment Story”, the simple enchantment of the wondrous “Gospel”. For all its seeming malaise, Boxer resonates with a blend of cautious joyousness, hopeless romanticism, and propulsive self-awareness. It is, in effect, a balm.

“Hold ourselves together with our arms around the stereo for hours”, Berninger sings, embracing the remedy that is music listening. “While it sings to itself, or whatever it does”.