The National live at Glastonbury 2024: every song is played like it could be the last

We catch up with The National’s Matt Berninger backstage a few hours before their Sunday night closing headline set at The Other Stage. Despite facing what could and should be another in a series of real ‘Glasto moments’ for the band, the frontman hasn’t much of a clue of what even he himself can expect. “I don’t like to know what’s going to be on the setlist, because every time is like a new flavoured gum ball,” he tells NME. “I get to take that little red pill and go to that song in a new way every time. If I knew what all the songs were then I wouldn’t be able to let go as much.”

There’s a sleepy vibe over Glastonbury tonight, with revellers seeming a little more reserved than usual after five days of music and hedonism. What better cure than indie statesmen The National – both a soothing balm and a rousing kick in the shins. When ‘Don’t Swallow The Cap’ kicks in and Berninger pulls a Jarvis Cocker-esque svelte silhouette, you know he’s ready to give Worthy Farm a sloppy kiss goodbye. It’s the shot in the arm we need. As he puts it himself on the spritely ‘Tropic Morning News’, “something has now rapidly improved”.

The National live at Glastonbury 2024. Credit: Andy Ford for NME

If you like this band, you love this band. The affection is palpable and reciprocated – both through the generosity of what you’d call “bangers” if you’re part of the cult of these self-proclaimed “sad dads”, and through Berninger getting as physical as he can with as many people as possible. During their “creepiest song” ‘Conversation 16’, he enacts the lyric “I was afraid I’d eat your brains, because I’m evil” when he attempts to devour a really rather delighted chap on the front row. For ‘Terrible Love’, he bolts past the safety barrier to play Pied Piper to the devotees who follow him with their phones.

There’s the glorious early outing of indie classic ‘Bloodbuzz Ohio’, and well-landed cuts from 2023’s double album treat of ‘The First Two Pages Of Frankenstein‘ and ‘Laugh Track‘. Kate Stables of This Is The Kit assists ‘Rylan’, while the band tackle the bleak state of politics in the US with ‘The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness’ and ‘Fake Empire’ (“This song keeps getting more and more appropriate – that is really depressing”). This is a performance of tension and release. The Dessner twins hold their axes aloft as a mirror to one another and shred into the night as Berninger loses himself again and again.

The National live at Glastonbury 2024. Credit: Andy Ford for NME

He really is taking that little red pill with each track. It’s one thing to have artfully crafted the perfect setlist for such an occasion, but it’s another to have the ability to play each and every song like it could be the last one. When the finale does come with Berninger and the crowd all choked up for the devastating ‘About Today’, we leave knowing that they couldn’t have done more.

The National’s Glastonbury 2024 setlist was:

‘Don’t Swallow the Cap’
‘Eucalyptus’
‘Tropic Morning News’
‘Bloodbuzz Ohio’
‘The System Only Dreams in Total Darkness’
‘I Need My Girl’
‘Conversation 16’
‘Abel’
‘Alien’
‘Space Invader’
‘Day I Die’
‘Light Years’
‘Rylan’
‘England’
‘Graceless’
‘Fake Empire’
‘Mr. November’
‘Terrible Love’
‘About Today’