THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => BAND => Topic started by: Spartan Pho3nix on 21 Feb 2006, 23:51
-
Whatcha all think?
-
Wait, it doesn't come out until like April...
-
April 18th, I believe.
-
So I never bought Rehearsing my Choir. But I really don't want to believe Pitchfork. Is it really that bad? Should I not bother buying it?
-
Well, I think it's good, but I had already decided that the Fiery Furnaces could do no wrong when they released it.
Perhaps more than any other Furnaces album, how you like RMC depends on your personal taste. I don't endorse stealing, but I think it's important that you hear something off RMC before you decide to buy it, however you choose to do so.
Of course, if you like it, you should pay for the whole thing!
-
Well, this album is much more active that Rehersing, but i find myself unable to get all the way throuhg one of these albums. They're so strenous.
-
Wait... "this album?" Do you have a leaked copy of Bitter Tea?
Also: You can't get through Gallowsbird's Bark? Or EP? I think maybe you're just not trying hard enough.
-
There are a small number of people who enjoy Rehearsing My Choir. I think that it would have been a good album, but I can't listen to it. It sounds bad. But, try to listen to some of it before you buy it to choose.
-
Fuck my ass. Bitter Tea has leaked. (http://blueberryboat.no3rdw.com/forum/index.php?action=vthread&forum=1&topic=401)
Well, I downloaded "Police Sweater Blood Vow" from Fluxblog, but other than that I'm holding out until I have the CD in my hands. YAY ANXIOUS WAITING
-
Police Seater Blood Vow has me fairly excited now. I might consider checking out the leaked album except I SUCK at getting leaked music. So I guess I will wait.
-
i've yet to get my hands on Rehearsing My Choir but since i'm such a Fiery Furnace fanboy, i'm going to assume it's amazing and go ahead and assume Bitter Tea will be great.
i'm too apathetic to download the tracks... so i'll wait until i have the spare cash to go and grab'em before i listen to'em.
-
anyone have a link....?
-
I can't listen to the Fiery Furnaces anymore. I blame my father, partly. But mostly myself. Oh well.
-
Why am I so stupid that I can't seem to find this album, I mean it shouldn't be that hard.
-
Liner notes. (http://www.thefieryfurnaces.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=393#393) They look pretty hot.
Also, SD, that's a damn shame. A damn shame.
-
A little bit of necroposting to celebrate (a) Bitter Tea's official release two days ago; and (b) the Fiery Furnaces show yesterday at the Bowery Ballroom, launching their Bitter Tea tour.
Eleanor took a little while took get in her groove (warming up with Chris Michaels), but once she was there, the band took flight. They did songs from all four albums (only the title song from Rehearsing My Choir, I think) and Blueberry Boat showed up in the encore (to be greeted by the screams of an enthusiastic audience).
They did four or five songs from Bitter Tea, and the standout was definitely "I'm In No Mood" -- the other's were good as well. As usual, they replaced the keyboard lines with guitar, and in the relatively small space of the Bowery this played rather well. All in all, a great concert, and I'm looking to their return to NYC in June (at Webster Hall this time). Catch them if you can.
-
I thought the album was conceptually interesting but a good bit dissapointing. The whole thing felt a little rushed and over-produced. Where Blueberry Boat was epic Bitter Tea is just confused. The backwards thing gets pretty obnoxious too. On the other hand its still a fucking Fiery Furnaces album so its awesome. They're coming here in June and I am hella excited.
-
I have a serious problem with RMC. I'm torn you might say. I love the tunes; they're classic FF, catchy and eccentric and neat. But then that bitches voice, oh god! Every time I hear her I wish she was here in my living room so I could kick her...in the face.
Edit: Yay! I finally no longer have a cantaloupe phobia!
Edit pt 2. Oh god! I'm listening to it right now and I got to that part in the first song where that bitchfuck is going "La La La". OH FUCK SHUT UP BITCH!
-
It was interesting, actually, because Eleanor and Matt were somewhere between hostile and apologetic about the whole RMC thing. On the one hand, they were definitely far less confident in their stage presence and delivery than when they were doing the RMC tour. On the other, prior to introducing the RMC title song, Matt said something along the lines of: "And here's a song that everyone should know, from everyone's favorite album."
I enjoyed RMC, but it's not in my regular rotation. I'm glad they did it though: there isn't any doubt that if they wanted to do White Stripes or Strokes style stuff they could fucking nail it -- the fact that they choose to go their own way is what makes them so awesome. They're one of the few bands I'm aware of with a typical instrumentation (guitar, keyboard, bass, drums) trying to do something interesting with lyrics, narrative, and song structure.
-
Edit pt 2. Oh god! I'm listening to it right now and I got to that part in the first song where that bitchfuck is going "La La La". OH FUCK SHUT UP BITCH!
Jesus, that's their fucking grandma, dude. Take a pill.
A Confucian respect-for-your-elders pill.
-
oh my god i got bitter tea in the mail
SHIT YES IT'S IN MY FUCKING HANDS
ohhhhhh man
-
I wish the Fiery Furnaces would stop spending so much time obfuscating otherwise excellent pop songs with backward vocals and wacky production.
EP is my favorite record of theirs, probably for this reason.
-
So I just discovered that playing the album backwards only makes it marginally worse. I don't know that thats a good thing.
-
After my first listen, I have derived the following:
Blueberry Boat × Rehearsing My Choir - grandma = Bitter Tea
-
I wish the Fiery Furnaces would stop spending so much time obfuscating otherwise excellent pop songs with backward vocals and wacky production.
I'll admit that I'm so fond of them, I may no longer qualify as objective went it comes to assessing their albums. But I don't mind having to work a bit to find the pop gem underneath the unorthodox editing. And, as I think this interview reflects, there are reasons for their funky stunts -- it's not just to be different. Read the bit at the end, in particular, about the contrasting roles of Grandmum and granddaughter in RMC.
I think there was a pretty good reason why they reversed Matt's vocals in every track. Bitter Tea is supposed to be Eleanor's story growing up, in contrast with her grandmother's in RMC. Eleanor and Matt hated each other as children. Hence the decision to reduce his vocals to babble.
-
I'll admit that I'm so fond of them, I may no longer qualify as objective went it comes to assessing their albums.
Totally with you on this. Bitter Tea was a foregone conclusion for me; I'd already decided the Furnaces could do no wrong.
There's a certain fiendish guilty pleasure in having such an arrangement with a band, like you know you're supposed to be a little more objective but you also know it's just not going to work that way, no chance.
My opinion of the Furnaces having survived Rehearsing My Choir unscathed, I can't see myself being objective about them any time soon.
Let me tell ya though, unconditionally loving a band that's released five essentially full-length albums in four years — and shows no signs of stopping any time soon — is pretty exhilarating.
-
Yeah, exhilerating especially because it is just a matter of time until Matt and Eleanor go their own ways because of either creative or personal differences. It's going to be interesting to see whether Eleanor goes for a Karen O style vocalist role in a typical band arrangement, or tries on a solo career.
-
Totally with you on this. Bitter Tea was a foregone conclusion for me; I'd already decided the Furnaces could do no wrong.
There's a certain fiendish guilty pleasure in having such an arrangement with a band, like you know you're supposed to be a little more objective but you also know it's just not going to work that way, no chance.
This is essentially how I feel about Deerhoof. But still, you can compare Bitter Tea to their other stuff can't you? Or is all their stuff equally brilliant?
-
Totally, jcknbl. But not yet, as I haven't listened to Bitter Tea enough to have absorbed it. It's going to be a little difficult, I think, to compare it to their earlier work in terms of quality, although I stand by my earlier equation.
Accessibility-wise, the ranking seems to go:
Gallowsbird's Bark > EP > Blueberry Boat > Bitter Tea > Rehearsing My Choir
which is to say that the claims that Bitter Tea would be a poppy album were largely erroneous.
Still, I've had "Police Sweater Blood Vow" stuck in my head all day.
-
I just saw them live in Manchester. It seems their entire purpose in life is to confound the world, and I love them for it. Going from quirky schizoid ADHD avant-pop on record to blistering psychadelic blues rock live and still keeping the songs recognisable is some sort of God-like achievement.
I don't know if it's because Blueberry Boat had sort-of preconditioned me, but I thought Bitter Tea was a far more accessible album, despite all the backwards vocals and production weirdness: heck, some of the songs actually had a recognisable structure with, like, verses and choruses and stuff. Crazy.
(also, I liked Rehearsing My Choir, but you kind of have to listen to it all in one go, which is hard work)
-
My opinion of the Furnaces having survived Rehearsing My Choir unscathed, I can't see myself being objective about them any time soon.
Unscathed might not be the right word. Mixed reviews, getting pushed out of Rough Trade Records over to Fat Possum (what the hell's up with them going there, anyway?) and generally being screwed over for a year seems to have left them a bit demure to me. And that's what I hear when I listen to Bitter Tea, which I haven't quite decided whether I like it or not.
On a different note, I think it's interesting to remember that Bitter Tea and Rehearsing My Choir were originally supposed to be a double album.
-
Every time I try to listen to Bitter Tea I just want to listen to Blueberry Boat or EP. That's just me, though. I also haven't given it enough time to soak in yet