Friendly Fires begin another long, slow burn
Friendly Fires gets bigger — in stature and sound
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It used to be a pretty straightforward formula: record, tour hard, take a break, rinse and repeat. If that’s still the music industry’s Yin (and it’s really not, but let me prove the point), Friendly Fires prefers the Yang. The British-born trio has been hitting it hard in 2011, touring nonstop for the better part of eight months and releasing an acclaimed album, Pala, amidst it all (Break? Who needs a break?). Friendly Fires isn’t the first road warrior, but they’re making a case for being one of the current best. With a sterling, matured live show (Atlanta marks the opening night of the current run of stateside dates) and the right mindset about, well, pretty much everything, Edd Gibson and company have a bright future in their sights.
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Friendly Fires with Theophilus London. $18. 9 p.m. Fri., Oct. 7. The Loft, 1374 West Peachtree St. 404-885-1365. www.centerstage-atlanta.com.
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You were on tour for a while before you actually released Pala, so how has the reception been and how have things changed since the release in May?
Edd Gibson: It’s been awesome. Since about February we’ve basically been on the road. We figured out we did about 37 festivals in total. Some tracks we’ve found are really catching on well, like “Hawaiian Air” which seems to be going really well live, we always find that one being sung back to us in whatever language we happen to be in the country of. There are songs that have mutated and become something totally different when we play them out live, as well. It’s been awesome seeing it happen.
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What does Pala do for your discography? Where does it fit?
EG: We’ve all been saying it feels like a debut for us, in a lot of ways. It’s this new, sort of personal sound. I can’t really pinpoint any specific influences or anyone really doing the same things at the moment. I love the first record, and I’m really proud of it, but we were definitely listening to and looking for a certain sound this time around and that permeated into it. This one sounds far more unique in our minds.
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What took so long between full-length records? Three years is a pretty long time.