New album for The National duein May

US indie rockers The National have announced they’ll release their sixth studio album sometime in May.

The announcement was made via the band’s Twitter account, following news that the group would be undertaking a tour of the US and Canada, playing some shows with Dirty Projectors.

Oh and also, thought you might like to know that we’ll be putting out a new album in May

— The National (@The_National) February 25, 2013

It’s now been three years since the release of The National’s High Violet, which we voted as one of our albums of the year for 2010. Dark and brooding, our reviewer said the album used “an intelligent spectrum of sounds to tell stories that will leave an indelible mark on your psyche. If you can listen to High Violet without hearing your own heart break, better check you still have a pulse”.

In 2011, the band travelled to Australia as part of the Harvest Festival, where they played alongside the likes of Portishead, The Flaming Lips and TV on the Radio.

Speaking to FL about High Violet before they arrived in Australia, the band’s bassist Scott Devendorf talked about the album’s painstaking recording process, with songs being radically re-recorded in some instances. “Songs like ‘Lemonworld’, which is a really simple song in a lot of ways, at one stage we had eight different versions of that … Just taking different flashes of the songs.”

In addition to their appearances at Harvest, they also played two headline shows in Adelaide and Perth. Photos of the Perth show here.