9. Eleanor FriedbergerPersonal Record

I really liked the Fiery Furnaces, but I think I prefer Eleanor’s solo stuff. And Personal Record is the one that I binged on when we were writing. I love the album title. I love a good pun.

Lyrically, this record’s really clever, and it’s really funny, and it wasn’t at all what I was expecting. It’s got that Television, Talking Heads thing going on. And it makes me smile. There’s some really sad stuff as well though – and actually, the song that we ended up doing together, ‘Chelsea Midnight’ [from Telling The Trees], has really sad lyrics. But I didn’t really notice that until the third or fourth listen, because it sounds like this little perfectly formed pop song. I think she’s great at doing that, as a lyricist. I think she does the thing that many of us – maybe that all of us – do, in trying to deflect insecurities with humour. But she manages to do that in a song, without making it sound like a novelty, which is a really rare thing. And she’s got an incredible voice. Personal Record did seem like a personal record. It seemed closest in feel to what I try and do – not musically closest, but closest in purpose. And because of that, I think I relate to it most. Especially the title.