The Fiery Furnaces (Eleanor and Matt Friedberger) new release, Bitter Tea is a strange an experimental album. I have been listening it trying to decide if I like it or not. What they seem to be doing on it is to be strange and spastic for no reason. I think the best way to go about it is to listen to each track, even though during each song you are taken all over the place. It’s like a story told by someone who is on some heavy drugs.
The first track is In my Little Thatched Hut. At least it gives you and idea of what you are to expect form the rest of the album. Waiting to Know has a strange and abrupt break towards the end as do most of the songs. Listening to two songs at once is what it sounds like. The Vietnamese Telephone Ministry reminds you of the Beatles Number 9, complete backwards sounds and lyrics. It’s fucking torturous.
The end of the album is better then the rest. It was pretty hard to get through to that point though. It starts around Oh Sweet Woods which isn’t bad because they maintain a beat. Borneo is OK, even when she sounds awkward during some parts. Never is actually a really good track and Benton Harbor Blues is probably what their title track should have been because it’s the longest most complex and interesting on the whole album. Their transitions from song to song are about the only thing that bring the songs together but the first half of the album is so weak that even those transistions and one great song can’t even bring it back from its own destructive force.
It’s a battle between synthetic sound and natural sound and in no way does that result in something that’s even all interesting. It’s not like The Flaming Lips where both sounds put together make something beautiful and strange. Instead their repetitive lyrics combined with annoying musical sounds become something incredibly boring to listen to until Benton Harbor blues. Being experimental can be risky but also can be pulled off, yet here it just sounds like they are fucking around with their instruments for no reason and it results in making you feel as if you are listening to someone having a seizure. If that’s the sound that they were going for it was successful and if you like something that’s on that side of the spectrum you may want to have a listen. Even then I would start it at track 8. Otherwise it leaves a taste in my mouth like I would expect a bitter tea to do.
