| Fleet Foxes |  | Artist: Fleet Foxes
Label: Bella Union
Category: Music
List Price: £11.99
Buy New: £3.90
as of 13/3/2010 18:06 CST details
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New (25) Used (16) from £2.77
Seller: onepeecd
Rating:  164 reviews
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.1
Dimensions (in): 5.3 x 4.9 x 0.2
EAN: 5033197507620
ASIN: B00180OTAI
Release Date: June 16, 2008
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Tracks:
| • | Sun It Rises | | • | White Winter Hymnal | | • | Ragged Wood | | • | Tiger Mountain Peasant Song | | • | Quiet Houses | | • | He Doesn't Know Why | | • | Heard Them Stirring | | • | Your Protector | | • | Meadowlarks | | • | Blue Ridge Mountains | | • | Oliver James |
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.co.uk Review
It's now twenty years since grunge emerged from then culturally isolated Seattle and Fleet Foxes, the eponymous debut album from the city's latest heroes, demonstrates just how much American independent rock has mutated in that time. The five young members of Fleet Foxes make up a very different sort of rock band, describing their own music as "baroque harmonic pop jams". Even that understates the depths of the quintet's effortless vocal harmonies and gently woozy, folky feel. Of their contemporaries only the enigmatic Midlake and My Morning Jacket at their most fragile come close, but neither could have cooked up the Beach Boys spiritual of "White Winter Hymnal" or its more powerful companion piece "Ragged Wood". In fact Fleet Foxes happily admit to aspiring to an earlier tradition--not just obvious antecedents like the Byrds, the Association, Neil Young and, especially, David Crosby's famously unfocussed solo album If Only I Could Remember My Name but ancient English folk songs and their later American descendents. All were hunted and gathered from the internet--songwriters Robin Pecknold and Skye Skjelset are barely in their twenties. Add a host of unlikely instruments and the results are stunning, the complete antithesis of mainstream stadium indie that has followed Arcade Fire. Still, the cover features a Bruegel painting of peasants that might have graced any Black Sabbath sleeve. In that way at least Fleet Foxes salute a local tradition. -—Steve Jelbert
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| Customer Reviews:
 'The sound of ancient voices ringing soft upon your ear' May 9, 2008
William Rycroft (Hertfordshire, UK)
81 out of 83 found this review helpful
In a recent interview Robin Peknold, lead singer and songwriter of Fleet Foxes said 'Four people singing is just as close as you can get musically, because you're all standing next to each other and you're all just an interval away. It just reminds me of family.' With these close harmonies Fleet Foxes made quite an impression at the South By Southwest Festival combining choral singing with folk, gospel, rock and pop to awesome effect. And after the glorious Sun Giant EP the sun has risen again on the debut album from the Seattle quintet.
Opener Sun It Rises begins with a bluesy sounding acapella before an acoustic guitar brings in a far more West Coast sound. A lovely beginning. White Winter Hymnal is an amazing track, the opening line repeated like a round as more voices join in to layer the harmonies on top of one another. The track builds before breaking down to just the voices again at the end. Simple but brilliant. Frequent references to the landscape and wildlife give the album a pastoral folksy feel typified by tracks like Meadowlarks and Blue Ridge Mountains. Ragged Wood has that country feel before quietening and allowing the voices to take control, making it two tracks in one really. Robin Peknold sings alone on Tiger Mountain Peasant Song to great effect, sounding like an ancient balladeer; the music both classical and contemporary. He Doesn't Know Why is a great pop song. Your Protector sounds like it could come from Civil War era America and with its flutes reminded me for some reason of Simon and Garfunkel. The album finishes with Oliver James, which tells the sad tale of a drowning. ' On the kitchen table that your grandfather did make/You in your delicate way will slowly clean his face/And you will remember when you rehearsed the actions of/An innocent and anxious mother full of anxious love'. Beautiful.
The album is strong, undeniably beautiful and will make a great soundtrack for quiet summer evenings. To steal a line of Peknold's this is 'The sound of ancient voices ringing soft upon your ear'.
Ignore at your peril May 29, 2008
rle17 (London, UK)
51 out of 54 found this review helpful
Poor Fleet Foxes, roundly dismissed by a leading UK indie magazine (which shall remain nameless) as "hippies who sing acapella". To which the obvious response is: what's wrong with that? They do it well - very well. Sun Giant, their debut EP, was quite an attention-grabber, and its promise is amply fulfilled by this almost uniformly excellent first album. Suitably, it opens with a Southern church-style acappella burst, oddly propounding a parody of weather lore: "Red squirrel in the morning/red squirrel in the evening." And then, with great assurance, it simply lifts off and coasts seamlessly. Comparisons with (UK-only) label mates Midlake are inevitable, given the shared massed vocal harmonies, acoustic folk influences and weird rural narratives in the lyrics, but really Fleet Foxes are a more accessible proposition: Robin Pecknold's writing packs this record full of grand pop hooks. The reverb is not only in-your-face but utterly spot-on; this is what the Walker Brothers might have sounded like if they'd had access to more modern studio technology, and what an additional joy it is to hear a modern record that is neither ridiculously compressed nor overlong (it lasts just over 39 minutes). Such is the quality that it's impossible to single out highlights; easier instead to identity just a couple of tracks which are slightly below par, including the closing vocals-and-guitar-only Oliver James, this take of which sounds it's trying a little too hard. A better farewell, likewise featuring just Pecknold and guitar, would have been the dazzling Isles, on the bonus CD that comes with certain editions of the album. But otherwise Fleet Foxes' debut is a sheer delight. The band say they've been working at their music for a long time, but as Peely used to say of the Smiths, Fleet Foxes seem to have sprung fully formed from the womb, and this album is all the proof that's needed.
Folk America and so much more! February 4, 2009
James B. Spink (Kent, UK)
17 out of 18 found this review helpful
The sticker on the front of this special version of Fleet Foxes debut album says that it now contains all Fleet Foxes songs yet recorded - but it doesn't! CD one contains the first album with no bonus tracks and CD two contains the Sun Giant ep with no bonus tracks - there is no sign of the Fleet Foxes eponymous self-released demo ep from 2006.
The missing tracks are
1. "She Got Dressed"
2. "In the Hot, Hot Rays"
3. "Anyone Who's Anyone"
4. "Textbook Love"
5. "So Long to the Headstrong"
6. "Icicle Tusk"
Anyone expecting to find these tracks here will be disappointed; it would have been nice to have had them added as bonus tracks.
However, that is a minor quibble and what you do get is superb timeless music with many influences - but still able to sound fresh and original. Robin Pecknold and Skyler Skjelset are the main members influencing the band's sound and direction and both are still relatively young - their musical maturity reflecting the diversity of their parent's musical taste. I didn't think I would ever hear another contemporary version of False Knight on the Road, a classic from the Martin Carthy era Steeleye Span (Child Ballad No 3), but Fleet Foxes tackle it and make it their own.
That's just one example of their varied influences; if someone had played me the album and told me it was a lost sixties classic I could easily have believed it. And yet it still manages to sound fresh and relevant to today; a rare achievement. It is classic American music that will stand the test of time - I just hope the follow-up, due later this year, can live up to the expectation. If you have enjoyed BBC4's recent season of Folk America programmes you will love the music here too.
I'm prancing through fields of daisies - and I don't care who knows it! June 4, 2008
Dougal (Lancashire)
15 out of 17 found this review helpful
My first reaction having listened to the first few tracks on this CD was to pretend I'd never bought it in the first place. Why? Well, a) I hate wasting money on music (particularly nowadays) and b) the CD is, well, how do you put it, a little sort of 'soft' (as in girly prancing through a field of daisies soft). But I stuck with it, listened through (having securely wound up the car window to avoid embarrassing aural seepage), then listened again. And guess what? I loft soft! But soft in this case means tunes, craft and melodies to humm, all day, every day. To hell with gritty miserableness and hello to the new summer of love!
A gently unfolding album full of beautiful melodies August 4, 2009
Rudy (Cardiff, Wales)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
After hearing alot of hype about this album I decided to give it a go. On the first listen, I must admit to not being that impressed. It didn't seem to live up to the hype. But then after a few more listens it just seems to make sense somehow. The music and voices just blend together to create a magical, relaxing album. I accept that saying it's relaxing may make some people want to vomit and look elsewhere but it's not what you think! Parts of this record remind me of Bon Iver and My Morning Jacket and it's a comparision well earned in my opinion. I can easily see this becoming a 5 star record with even more listens. I think if you enjoy either of the artists mentioned above or other bands like Grandaddy, Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev, Beach Boys or The Wrens then there is much for you to enjoy and marvel at on this excellent album. If I was forced to pick my favourite songs then I'd say White Winter Hymnal, Ragged Wood, Tiger Mountain Peasant Song and Your Protector. Highly recommended.
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