Rough Trade Us
2005
Rehearsing My Choir
About This Album
For better or worse, Rehearsing My Choir -- the Fiery Furnaces' collaboration with their grandmother, Olga Sarantos -- is a family reunion set to tape: equally intimate and insular. It's not that the audience isn't invited to listen in, it's just that the Friedberger siblings and their grandma are so in their element that they don't necessarily notice when their listeners aren't following along. The album, which loosely interprets and embellishes some of Sarantos' memories of life in Chicago (using Eleanor's vocals as flashbacks and Sarantos' as the voice of experience) is easily their most challenging work yet. Interestingly, along with Sufjan Stevens' Illinois, it's also the second indie album in 2005 to explore Chicago and its environs. But while Illinois plays like a Fodor's Guide, Rehearsing My Choir is more like asking a local for directions or a recommendation for a really good pizza place and hearing bits and pieces of their life story along the way. Theoretically, Rehearsing My Choir's singular story should make it a more focused work than Blueberry Boat, but its rambling, stream-of-consciousness feel makes it even harder to get your bearings in the storytelling.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5,6,9 and 10)

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.