Title Fight: "Lit Up"

Illustration titled "The Wapaloosie" by Coert du Bois from William T. Cox's Fearsome Creatures of the Lumberwoods, 1910

Lush's 1994 album Split has never really made a big impression with me - I've always much preferred their other two albums (although it's weird that they only ever released three albums, isn't it?) I noticed recently that just a cursory glance at Split's tracklist reveals it to be an invitation to title fights against a lot of my favorite bands. It has songs called "Invisible Man" (the Breeders), "Undertow" (REM), "Blackout" (Pavement), "Lovelife" (the Rutles), and, of course, "Lit Up" (the National). "Lit Up" isn't really one of my favorite National songs, but the National is one of my favorite bands right now. How does their "Lit Up" match up against one of the best songs on my least favorite Lush albums?

Lush's "Lit Up", like a surprising majority of the songs on Split, was written by guitarist Emma Anderson and not the band's frontwoman Miki Berenyi. I like Anderson's dreamy, Cocteau-Twinsy sound as a contrast to Berenyi's more aggressive pop approach, and "Lit Up" is a good showcase of the band's ability to use harmonies, layers of reverb, and a few crystal-clear guitar lines to make a lovely song. It's probably my favorite song on Split, while the National's "Lit Up" is one of my least favorite songs on their 2005 album Alligator. It was the band's third single from the album, and I think my problem with it has a lot to do with the fact that it is such an obvious attempt at a radio-friendly single - that's not what I like from the National, a band that is at its best when they're not trying to impress anyone. The chorus is just kind of *blah*, and the thick sound undermines Matt Berninger's excellent lyric, although the line "You wear your skirt like a flag and everything surrounds you" almost wins this face-off single-handedly.

In the end, though, I think I prefer what Lush does with the title phrase, evoking luminescence where the National are definitely referring to the phrase's other meaning - the state of being sloppy, falling-down drunk.

Winner: LUSH

"Lit Up" by Lush

"Lit Up" by the National