If the lack of activity over the past month wasn’t a clue, I haven’t been feeling particularly inspired lately. Cue a new song from the National – just in time. I won’t even pretend to be anything other than the unobjective fanboy of the band I’ve been for the past eight years.

“Demons” is the first official leak from the forthcoming album Trouble Will Find Me, due out May 21. Where 2010’s “England” – and so many National songs before it – slayed me with triumphant crescendoes, “Demons” settles into a comfortable groove from the get-go. Matt Berninger, as usual, sings a tick behind the beat, giving the song an almost unnerving flow. But his talk-sing baritone keeps it together until the knockout, insecure chorus: “But I stay down, with my demons. I stay down, with my demons”

And I’ve been harping on this for years, but I think we can all agree that drummer Bryan Devendorf is the unheralded star of this and so many National songs. His drumming is a study in restrained control. As much as I love seeing a drummer become unhinged, there’s something similarly satisfying about a drummer who makes a statement by being understated, a composed level of self-control and confidence that reigns over a song. And Devendorf has done it here. Again.