Eleanor Friedberger

Eleanor Friedberger was born into a musical family in Oak Park, IL, a western suburb of Chicago. Her mother, a Gilbert and Sullivan enthusiast, played the guitar, piano and sang while her grandmother was a choir director and played the organ at a nearby Greek Orthodox Church. Friedberger's brother Matthew was four years older than her and played the upright bass all through high school. However, the siblings were rarely close when growing up and only began their musical collaborations after college and separate trips throughout Europe. Eleanor spent a year living and working in London before she moved to Brooklyn with her brother in 2000 and started gigging in small clubs the same year. After graduating to support slots with Sleater-Kinney and Spoon, in 2002 the siblings began work on the demos that would become their debut album Gallowsbird Bark (2003). A mixture of garage rock stylings and songs that were inspired by Friedberger's time spent in London, the album almost inevitably had the press comparing The Fiery Furnaces to The White Stripes. Although the album was well received by the rock press, the band's second release Blueberry Boat (2004) was more problematic: the opening track "Quay Cur" switched styles and tempos so many times during the course of its 10-minute span that people struggled to find a hook. The fact that many of the record's songs had similarly lengthy runtimes made them unsuitable for commercial radio airplay.Nevertheless the band enjoyed greater exposure and won new fans as they spent much of 2004 touring as a support for The Shins and Franz Ferdinand. Eleanor began a long-term relationship with Franz Ferdinand frontman Alex Kapranos. The Scottish band's bittersweet "Eleanor Put Your Boots On," which featured on their second album You Could Have It So Much Better (2005), was re-recorded and released as a single in 2006. The short, but much more accessible, album EP (2005) was a compilation of all The Fiery Furnaces' previous singles and B-sides -- most of which had hitherto only been available in Britain -- as well as two new songs which were considerably more radio-friendly. However, the Friedbergers were hardly chasing chart success with their second release of that year. Rehearsing My Choir (2005) was a concept album about the siblings' grandmother which interspersed Olga Sarantos's seemingly stream of consciousness anecdotes about her own life with swirling, psycheelic instrumentation. It made for a challenging listen even to hard-core fans of the band. Defying expectations, Bitter Tea (2006) was the band's poppiest collection yet, a collection strongly influenced by German synth group Kraftwerk. Although not a concept album, the band turned songs from the album into a half-hour seamless medley when they played it live. Window City (2007) was a 1970s-themed rock album with catchy riffs and judicious use of the wah-wah pedal; as on Blueberry Boat, songs changed tack several times over their length to form a tapestry of musical collages.I'm Going Away (2009) was yet another change of pace, a mostly "warmer" and more piano-driven sound that showcased Friedberger's lyrical virtuosity and soulful voice rather than her brother's musical hyperactivity. It was followed by Take Me Around Again (2009) which consisted of the same songs as I'm Going Away, but with each sibling recording half the songs by themselves, a sure sign of a duo going their separate ways. However, The Fiery Furnaces never officially split up: they merely went "on hiatus" after playing The Primavera Sound Festival in 2011. Friedberger did break-up with her boyfriend Alex Kapranos in 2009 and some of the songs on her debut solo album Last Summer (2010) are inevitably influenced by their split. However the 19 70s-inflected sounds of the album were no introspective misery fest. Instead, Freidberger successfully captured the giddy spirit of being young and carefree again. With its summery, jangly guitars, up-tempo disco rhythms and a clearly optimistic voice that, for once, was not compelled to suddenly change key suddenly due to her brother's ever inventive instrumentation, Last Summer was quite possibly the most joyous break-up album ever. Fittingly it won Friedberger a whole new legion of followers who, in the past, may well have been deterred by The Fiery Furnaces' experimental sounds. Friedberger's second solo album Personal Record (2013) built upon the strengths of her debut. Once again it demonstrated her love of '70s-style instrumentation and a winning insistence on a "summery" vibe, but songs such as "Echo And Encore" and "Other Boys" showed Friedberger was willing to allow her songwriting to become a little more emotional. She maintained both that sound and lyrical directness for her next two albums, New View (2016) and Rebound (2018).