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Album Details

• Artist: Fiery Furnaces
• Album: I'm Going Away
• Label:
• Year of Release: 2009
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: tosnob on 2009-08-11

Seven albums into their career and New York indie act The Fiery Furnaces may have made their most accessible album to date. It may still be outside the spectrum of mainstream rock, but I'm Going Away should be ease to digest for most indie fans.

The album opens with the brother and sister duo of Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger performing in their usual intriguing style. The album opener "I'm Going Away" is typical Fiery Furnaces with odd cadences and ever-shifting time signatures. Next up is "Drive To Dalls" which sucks you in at first, acting as a more orthodox piano ballad before breaking down several times into a frenzied guitar piece with escalating tempo.

After that the album settles down, as do the pair.

"The End Is Near" is a loungy piano piece. "Charmaine Champagne" is a bubbly art rocker. The back-to-back "Cut The Cake" and "Even In The Rain" are methodical Pavement-like slackers. While slightly twee in sound, "Lost At Sea" is otherwise straightforward. Most amazingly "Keep Me In The Dark" actually has a sustained danceable groove. The album is topped off by "Take Me Round Again", a bright peppy run around the park featuring endearing vocal interplay between the siblings.

If you're the type who enjoy The Fiery Furnaces for their way-out-there style you will probably not love I'm Going Away. Those of us who found their style a little too, shall I say pretentious, in the past will be able to look at The Fiery Furnaces in a new light.

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