With her escapist blend of post punk, alt-rock and alluring pop-infused songwriting, Friedberg’s sound is primed for a night out, “I hear the trees applaud as we ride by”.
The project itself was born out of a vision to create a totally new sound for London-based Anna Friedberg (writer, vocals, cowbell, guitar, and more cowbell) and backed by a stellar cast of musicians, Emily Linden (guitar, vocals), Cheryl Pinero (bass, vocals) and Laura Williams (drums), they are developing exactly that. Music that is both immediately familiar but also like nothing you’ve ever heard before. Friedberg, when literally translated, means "peaceful mountain", but this is far from the frenetic and feisty sound of Anna’s colossal new project and her debut EP ‘Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah’.
Growing up in a small Austrian town, Anna was exposed to music at a young age via classic rock enthused parents who were not shy to break out a guitar at family gathering. Whilst studying English Literature and working weekends as a sports journalist, she began to share her music online, and it wasn’t long before one of her songs was plucked for a TV commercial. A whirlwind of activity followed, record deal, critical acclaim in Austria, a #3 hit on the Austrian charts and opening sets for Lenny Kravitz around Europe. Looking back on it now, she still can't quite believe it. "It was all a quick flash – I wasn't even ready!" she exclaims.
Free of her deal she moved to Berlin, then London “I was just writing songs, thinking about what I really wanted, finding that sound, doing some crazy road trips, getting inspired" she says. One such road trip to the Mojave Desert with Daniel Brandt (Brandt Brauer Frick) and Matthias Biermann (Roosevelt) proved to be an early breakthrough in finding that sound. It was there the trio wrote Friedberg's debut single, ‘Boom’, a cowbell-led, ode to a toxic relationship, “It’s about a time when I was living in Berlin, my whole friend group kind of separated through one woman, who really cheated on us all in a way." Anna recalls in regard to ‘Boom’, a dissonant, sirens call with its ominous riff and seductive, seemingly benign vocal.
Returning to London, and charged with the energy the new collaborators sparked, Anna met guitarist Emily at a show in Soho. The pair instantly hit it off, and she swiftly introduced Anna to bassist Cheryl and drummer Laura and Friedberg was born. "We just jammed for three days, I had never had such a feeling before with any other band," she says. "It just clicked. For the first time it was just me, with friends, doing music."
Friedberg booked a secret show in Soho that summer and captivated the audience with their riotous energy. A booking agent who had overheard the show from the bar signed them on the spot, and a flurry of festivals followed, with sets at Eurosonic, Reeperbahn festival, and headline shows in Germany and Austria. Their single ‘Go Wild’ with its hungover, Madchester-like swagger, begs disobedience, “...bubble up the bathtub / falling on my face / you better keep in mind that / you gotta go wild”. Mixed by Ash Workman (Christine & The Queens, Metronomy) its smooth groove quickly yielded placements with FIFA 20 the BBC's Normal People adaptation, Netflix success Biohackers and other shows across the world. Months of UK/Euro touring behind the new tracks refined Friedberg’s direction and continued to grow their awareness with radio and press, with ‘Go Wild’ hitting the #1 track at alternative radio station FM4 (Austria) and landing the band on a number of Ones to Watch lists including the prestigious Musik Express in Germany.
"For the first time, I feel like I'm really doing what I want to do, what I always wanted to do," says Anna, "before, my insecurities and my own fears were in the way, and I was pushed around by so many people who said, 'you should do this or that'. It took me a long time to find what I really wanted.... it's such a good feeling."
Riding high on the success of ‘Go Wild’, the following months were spent touring and harnessing the energy of the live shows while further refining the sound in both Berlin and London with original collaborators Daniel and Matthias and a new-found creative partner Matt Allchin (Florence & The Machine, Soak, George Ezra). The five songs that make up the forthcoming debut EP ‘Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah’, showcases Anna's darker, more experimental songwriting voice as well as taking inspiration from her favourite writers (author Thomas Bernhard and poet T. S. Eliot, among others). Heavily influenced by 1980s New York band ESG and the minimalist, percussive style of LCD Soundsystem, Anna approached the new songs with an ear for rhythm. She picks out the bass-driven, ‘Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah’ as one of her favourites on the record, "because I like post-punk so much, and somehow I almost got a little bit of an ESG vibe there."
The EP’s duality of upbeat, dance-inducing songs and emotionally heavy lyrics on topics of fear, insecurity and the breakdown of a codependent relationship, feel like an all-night party that ends up with new friends on the roof in fuzzy conversation, content in life’s mysteries. Opening track, "Pass Me On", with its swirling guitars, vintage fuzz and shaker, is a searing account of love in turmoil: "With every breath that I breathe, you make me feel like a thief”. "It was a constant drama," Anna says of the relationship that inspired the song. "It was just the worst thing – to feel so much- that you depend on someone, that you need someone else to make you complete." The bittersweet feeling is captured in the song's slow build: the vocals are breathy, stoned yet they come with an assured sting.
“Lizzy” boasts more psychedelic origins, with its eerie synth chords and insistent drums, documenting a trip Anna experienced at a party, where she hallucinated herself inside the T. S. Eliot poem, The LoveSong of J. Alfred Prufrock. The tender, acoustic "Your Hollywood" was written using the cut-up method, a postmodern writing style favoured by the likes of Bowie and Burroughs. Anna wrote the song by tearing words out of newspapers, gradually piecing together a heart-rending story of a relationship she had lost herself in. "It's so crazy how it makes so much sense – obviously, what you want to say subconsciously, you see those things, and you pick the things that make sense for you." The result is one of the most bruisingly honest moments on the EP, with Anna's vocal masterfully walking the thin line between fragility and strength. “I was just hoping to find something better // in your Hollywood, your Hollywood // but there ain’t no rainbow // in the middle of the night // when you’re a tenant // of these torn skies”
Friedberg is the result of different cities, various relationships and a “how did I get here” career moment. The result of finding your way through the sometimes-confusing net of moving, leaving or changing - that courage from moving forward, creating the ease of finding that sound, your people, that “a-ha” feeling and enjoying it at long last.
Tracklist
A1: Pass Me On
A2: Lizzy
B1: Yeah
B2: Midi 8
B3: Your Hollywood
