If you've ever heard a Fiery Furnaces album, you know how tough it would be to pull that stuff off live. To recreate something that even remotely resembled the albums, you'd need about five guitarists, two drummers, and maybe eight keyboard players. And I knew that the Furnaces only toured with a four-man band, and that their live performances didn't much resemble the albums, but I still didn't really know what to expect. So it was with a high degree of anticipation that I went to see them.
The other reason I was really looking forward to it is because I love the Fiery Furnaces. Every single album they've done is great, and they're one of the most inventive and unique bands in the world. They're one of the few bands who could pick pretty much any song from their entire catalog and make me happy. I love them enough to have written about them one, two, three, and four times at this very site.
But first (actually second, but I didn't get there in time to see the first band), I had to see Man Man. I knew nothing about Man Man going into the show other than that they're from Philadelphia (bonus points!) and that they have a stupid band name (points off!). They started playing, and I hated them almost immediately. It sounded like the Mahavishnu Orchestra trying to be the Mars Volta. It was repellent. Then they calmed down a bit and got into some actual songs, and what do you know! They're actually really good! It's easy to see why the Fiery Furnaces have them on tour with them, because they're just as batshit crazy as the Furnaces are. The phrase that kept coming to mind is "precision train wreck." They walk a perfect balance between structure and absolute chaos, and by the time four of the five members were blowing simultaneously through party favor horns (the fifth member was playing a melodica, of all things), I was smiling with glee. I'll have to check out their albums and see if they bring half the ruckus of their live show.
So then the Fiery Furnaces went on. As I'd mentioned before, I expected something different, but I wasn't prepared for how different it would be. Faced with the unenviable and more or less impossible task of recreating their own music, they did the only thing they could do: they didn't even try. Every song was restructured, often with only the melody left intact, and sometimes not even that. Maybe all those comparisons they got to the Who awhile back were actually referring to their live show, because that was really the closest reference point. If the Fiery Furnaces on record are an unpredictable mash up of every possible instrument, mood, and genre, the Fiery Furnaces live are a driving, power rock outfit with prog-rock chops.
The result was almost like watching a cover band, except no cover band on this planet would touch a song like "The Garfield El" with a 20-foot pole. I was wondering if they'd play anything from Rehearsing My Choir, and they did a three song medley from it, with Matt and Eleanor splitting the vocal duties of their octogenarian grandmother (what? she wouldn't come on tour with them?). If the songs from that album confused people in their recorded versions, I can't even imagine what they would feel like watching them performed live. Hell, even I had trouble following them, and I've heard them a hundred times.
Of course, that's true for about the entire set. The Furnaces' songs tend to take tons of undpredictable hairpin turns as it is, and live they're usually played at double time or more, with completely different arrangements. "Quay Cur" was virtually unrecognizable, as was "My Little Thatched Hut." Even songs that they could have given a fairly straight reading ("My Dog Was Lost but Now He's Found," "Tropical Iceland") were completely different (although "Crystal Clear" and "Chris Michaels" somehow came through relatively unscathed). And I was so busy wondering what they were going to do with the myriad synth parts that I didn't even think about how they were going to replicate all the backwards lyrics and stuff until they started playing "Black Hearted Boy." But ultimately, to wonder about that is to miss the point. This wasn't about replication. It was about reinvention. I should expect nothing less from the Fiery Furnaces.
Overall, I think I'll take the studio versions of their songs over the live ones, and they lack a real forceful and charismatic lead singer (although Eleanor was clearly more comfortable than Matt), but it was hard not to be impressed by the skill necessary to pull off what they did. I'd like to hear a live album from them sometime.
p.s. At the top of the post is a picture I took. I hope it works ok. I'm new at posting photos to this thing.
1 comment:
interesting. that's basically what i thought as well. there was a good portion of the show during which i was kind of confused. "teach me sweetheart" was weird for me. but one thing is for sure, they are good at what they do.
i took a similar picture, except it was to demonstrate the hugeness of this afro that was directly in front of me. it blocked over half of the band.
when did Man Man begin going with them? i saw FF 3 days before you and the openers were We Are Scientists. weird.
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