Album Review: Eleanor Friedberger - Rebound

Eleanor Friedberger was the voice of the quirky and inventive The Fiery Furnaces before going it alone. Now onto her fourth solo album, she's more than established herself as a fine songwriter and clearly decided to stretch out into some new sonic territory on the more electronically textured Rebound.

Eschewing the knotty indie-guitar sound, she's delved into a more synthetic world of drum machines, keyboards and melancholic music that references the sadder side of '80s pop but is in no way a nostalgia exercise. There's a patina to the music whereby the songs sound lush and contemporary, with one foot in simple melodic pop and the other in the art-pop world of artists like Stereolab.

The single Make Me A Song is as catchy as anything she's done in the past and demonstrates her playful wordplay and consistently infectious way with a chorus hook. The downbeat thrum of Nice To Be Nowhere recalls both Julee Cruise and Jack Ladder in its plaintive soft focus sway while Are We Good? dances with a playful kosmische pulse. Her use of electronic sounds adds a warmth to these songs rather than colder machine-like qualities. It's a re-housing of her songs in a new setting and she's again matched it with sensitive and astute songwriting.