(Frenchkiss)
In 2016, Eleanor Friedberger spent a month in Athens, Greece, ending up in what the half-Greek American describes as an “80s goth disco” – called Rebound – where everyone did a solitary dance routine called the chicken dance. “I copied the slouchy strut,” she remembers, “swinging my arms in time to music that sounded like Joy Division but was probably a knock-off by an unknown Baltic band. It was alienating and exhilarating.”
Two years later, this same sense of giddy disconnection fires her fourth and best solo album, but although Rebound resurfaces as the location for It’s Hard (“where time stands still”), it’s otherwise a long way from crimped hair and eyeliner. Instead, vaguely gothic themes of loneliness, miscommunication and isolation are channeled into warm, quirky electronic pop that’s more gently uplifting than melancholy. It’s a radically different musical landscape to that which Friedberger occupied in her indie rock Fiery Furnaces days (with brother Matthew), or on previous solo albums. Guitars are used sparingly but effectively. Mostly, synthesisers and drum machines produce beatific electronic pop with traces of Laurie Anderson or Yellow Magic Orchestra, while Friedberger’s soaring singing recalls Russell Mael of Sparks.
Continue reading...by Dave Simpson via Electronic music | The Guardian
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