Lovable though the Fiery Furnaces are, part of the brother-and-sister duo’s charm is its tendency to upend any moments of pop perfection with cacophonous noises, fractures in song structure, and other sonic disturbances. Thankfully, on Last Summer, her first solo outing, Furnaces singer Eleanor Friedberger doesn’t obscure her talent for writing poppy folk-rock songs peppered with detailed observations: The gorgeous “Scenes from Bensonhurst” laments the lack of surprises when meeting someone in the age of social media; “Roosevelt Island” rides a funky clavinet figure while recalling a gleeful, druggy day in New York; and “I Won’t Fall Apart on You Tonight” is a piano-driven pounder about a confounding breakup.
This article appears in Apr 26 – May 2, 2012.
