When Chvrches first started teasing their forthcoming album, Love Is Dead, the Scottish synth-pop trio said that it would be “the most pop stuff we’ve done.” This album marks the first time Chvrches worked with outside producers, electing to collaborate on 13 of the 14 tracks with Greg Kurstin (Sia, Adele). Love Is Dead will be out in May, and when lead single “Get Out” dropped last month, we got a taste of what’s to come. The song doesn’t sound all that different from Chvrches’ earlier work, but it certainly is a polished bit of pop music.

Soon after “Get Out” debuted, we learned that one of the songs on Love Is Dead would feature the National’s Matt Berninger. That track is called “My Enemy” and it’s out now. All of the verses are sung by Berninger with Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry picking up the chorus. It’s a song about how easily love fades and can turn into something much more sinister. “All your words are so cold, so callous, so clean/ And the moment you could be honest, you could wake up/ Your jealousy is more blind than love,” Berninger sings. Mayberry answers him: “You could be my enemy/ You could be my judge.”

Berninger and Mayberry interviewed one another back in 2015, after Chvrches released their sophomore effort Every Open Eye. Mayberry commented on how the two met in a press release:

We had played a few festivals together but really got to know Matt when we were involved in 7 Inches For Planned Parenthood, a fundraising and awareness campaign that he spearheaded. It’s really inspiring and reassuring to meet other artists you admire and realise that they are trying to do some good in the world. We kept in touch after that and, when it came time to record My Enemy, Iain and Martin suggested I email Matt to see if he’d like to sing on it. We never realistically thought he’d have time to do it but he replied right away and recorded the track at his house the next day.

Listen to “My Enemy” and check out the Love Is Dead tracklist below.

TRACKLIST:
01 “Graffiti”
02 “Get Out”
03 “Deliverance”
04 “My Enemy”
05 “Forever”
06 “Never Say Die”
07 “Miracle”
08 “Graves”
09 “Heaven/Hell”
10 “God’s Plan”
11 “Really Gone”
12 “ii”
13 “Wonderland”

Love Is Dead is out 5/25 via Glassnote.