Results tagged “fleetfoxes”

Our predilection for local county/folk songsmiths aside, our interest was piqued when we heard that a Brooklyn band that has received praise for playing melodies in roughly the same vein would be hitting Chop Suey tonight in support of Ben Kweller. In advance of their first trip to Seattle, we were able to catch up with mandolinist and singer Danny Erker of Jones Street Station to talk about exploring “the great American genres,” and reconciling playing traditionally rural music in urban settings, among other topics.

After seeing the recently announced lineups for Coachella and Bonnaroo, one thing was pretty clear: both lineups are strong, but altogether there's only a couple Seattle bands playing at either fest.

According to last weekend's Saturday Night Live, this Saturday's episode will be hosted by crazy Republican (in that it's crazy she's a Republican) Rosario Dawson, along with the first SNL appearance by musical guest Fleet Foxes. Claims NME, "The Seattle indie rockers will be just the sixth band from an independent label to snag the coveted spot on the legendary US television show in its more than 30-year history." No word as to whether Robin Pecknold will pull a Taylor Swift and bring his bedazzled guitar.

KEXP is counting down the top 90.3 (.3?) albums of 2008 and is asking all of us to help them out by paying them a visit and voting for your favorites. Countdown closes this Friday, December 19th. Our picks include David Byrne & Brian Eno, Drive-By Truckers, Fleet Foxes, Helms Alee, Jake One, Love Is All, Lupe Fiasco, New Faces, Santogold, The Knux, The Moondoggies, The Saturday Knights, The Black Keys, to name a few. How about you? Feel free to share in the comments!

They've already garnered Mojo's #1 spot in the British mag's 2008 Top 50, as well as #2 in Uncut and Q and #6 in Paste (thanks to Stereogum for compiling this shit). Now the Fleet Foxes are getting some local year-end love too. In this month's Sound Magazine, Robin Pecknold and Co. didn't get Artist of the Year (that went to Jake One, thankyouverymuch), but the Fleet Foxes did win Year of the Year [RealRead Viewer], um, we guess for having an awesome year.

In this week's Rolling Stone, the annual "Hot Issue" (and yes, the one with Britney on the cover), working at the Cha's Cha's burrito kitchen gets blurbed as a "Hot Rocker Job." Citing the "kitchen staff of insanely talented musicians moonlighting as line cooks," there are a couple quotes from a certain former employee/maybe bland Fleet Foxes frontman, along with a list of other groups associated with Bimbo's: Modest Mouse, Band of Horses, the Melvins, Hole, Minus the Bear, Pretty Girls Make Graves, and Murder City Devils. So now you know which bands gave you food poisoning.

In the middle of a nostalgic discussion of Freddie Mercury and the sadly absent Great Frontmen of today's rock and roll, Spin.com's Abigail Everdell tosses a mild-to-moderate barb in the Fleet Foxes' direction: "Many talented singers today don't have the presence or style to distinguish themselves as lasting personalities. I'd group most honey-throated folk singers in here (think Fleet Foxes' Robin Pecknold singing for thousands while slouching in a chair)..." Zing! See what she did there? The group's eponymous debut full-length has received almost unanimous accolades in the national press, but this Seattlest has remained unconvinced that the Foxes should be granted top-tier, all-time awesome/exciting status--and it looks like Everdell agrees.

Amazon has come out with their Top 10 lists for the year, and check out the hiphop picks:

We know it looks like them, but we assure you this is not The Fleet Foxes. Share photos of your favorite bearded Seattle musicians in the Seattlest Flickr Pool

      

Greenlake was alive with color yesterday. Striking red and gold leaves lit up the sky, bringing smiles to the faces of our fellow trail goers. Took a little longer than usual to make the trek, as we (and others) stopped often to take pictures. Unfortunately, we only had our phone with us, so these will have to do for now.

All that talk of lumberjack chic returning to the Seattle scene got us all unintentionally heated under our (flannel) collar about our favorite local band rocking the oh-so-hot look: The Moondoggies. The next big thing out of Seattle sounds like the best of what was created at Big Pink, full of rollicking dusty blues, molasses-thick harmonies, and some straight up shit-kicking rockers.

Ellen Carpenter over at SPIN.com makes a great point: plaid is so, so in these days. Look at that Robin Pecknold from Fleet Foxes (pictured), Tom Hobden from Noah And The Whale, or J. Tillman! Something about the gentle, guitar-stroking, whiskered man just screams "I'm humble and gruff, yet still empathetic. And I probably smell like cedar, if you get close enough." Riffs Carpenter after a Fleet Foxes show,

I could have overlooked their militantly woodsy ensembles--they are from the Pacific Northwest, after all--if half of the audience hadn’t been rocking the same look. It seemed like a joke, like one of those Improv Everywhere missions. A flash mob: Lumbercon!

Volume One was pretty cool. Two was better. Three was great. Volume Four is hands down the best. Is it simply because it's new? Because the songs are still fresh? We don't think so. There's more more to it than that.

The Seattle Weekly just brought this Fleet Foxes tidbit to our attention--we didn't realize this, but the Wall Street Journal has a popular music critic, one Mr. Jim Fusilli. In an effort to cross generational gaps, he wrote a story about the Brian-Wilson-flavored harmonies in vogue with the kids today (Starling Electric, Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver), and even rang up the Fleet Foxes' Robin Pecknold for an interview. Pecknold is always interview gold. The money quote follows: "We weren't coming at it from a jazz point of view," said Mr. Pecknold, who is 22 years old. "We wanted something simple, like old folk music." Strict, structured harmonies "can sound too lush, too '70s, too 'Hall & Oatesy,'" he added. "It's better when you experiment and find different notes to sing."

      

Hip hop's The Saturday Knights are a Seattle band and proud of it, from Tilson's Sonics cap to the samples from the Fleet Foxes' "White Winter Hymal" and Band of Horses' car commercial. We weren't really dying to hear anything on Sunday night except TSK's Tilson, Barfly, and DJ Suspence, and they lived up to our expectations. New to us was Tilson's elegy for Isaac Hayes, sung over a sample from the theme to Shaft. It's hard to stay in focus, we learned, when you're helplessly dancing and singing along. Also that Tilson is a hyperkinetic son of a bitch.

It'd be easy to bitch and complain about certain aspects of the Capitol Hill Block Party. Sure, it attracts a bevy of tools who by the end of the night are barely-standing drunken douchebags. And yes, you have to put up with the poorly-scripted political pablum in between acts. Plus, in the aftermath, there's all that garbage. But in the midst of the typical festival chaos, there are plenty of things to praise about this year's block party. Here's our list:

Head Like a Kite: By the time we got into Neumos, we'd unfortunately missed most of their set. Whatever they were playing when we walked in, it was awesome and everyone was into it. It wasn't long, however, before they went into show-closing mode with more ethereal, experimental jam stuff. We dig Head Like a Kite, but they also bore us sometimes.

Friday: Catch Common Market (4:30) and U.S.E. (5:30) at the main stage, then skip over to King Cobra for the second half of Truckasaurus (6:00). Take a dinner break (may we suggest eating something protein-heavy?), then get yerself to Neumo's for Thee Emergency at 7:45. After that, we suggest Das Llamas (it's their last set...THEIR LAST ONE!) at 9:45 at the Cha Cha. To round out the night, buy yourself a fancy rum drink at Havana and party until the wee hours with DJ Curtis.

Casey Neill is one of our personal favorites from that other Northwest city with the other great music scene. He and his Norway Rats play hard-drinking folk-rock ala the Dylan meets the Pogues, meets early R.E.M, and they'll be joining some great Seattleites, Kasey Anderson and the Crying Shame's Arlan and Dylan, at the Sunset this Thursday.

The Boston Phoenix came up with a "Best Of" list, organized state by state, of the greatest bands ever. They chose three categories for each state of our diverse Union: Best Band of All Time, Best Solo of All Time, and Best New Band. Are you ready for Boston's take on Washington's musical legacy?

Throw away your razors, guys, and embrace your inner mountain man: it's time to start cultivating your entry in the first ever North American Beard and Moustache championship. The prestigious follicle competition will take place in Bremerton, Wash. on July 5th. The competition, put on by Bremerton's Whisker Club, is expected to bring moustaches, as well as the faces to which they are attached, from as far away as Europe.

We clued you in to this last October, but now it's official: Sub Pop Records is celebrating its 20-year existence with a three-day comedy and music festival July 11-13. And the (initial) lineup, though weighted more heavily in the hipster-ish now, features a few super acts from the label's big then.

It's weeks like this that make us glad to be writing about rock in Seattle, because a pair of American indie's leading lights are coming to town this Thursday and Friday.

Seattlest is quaking in their boots (bought especially for the occasion) with excitement for this years SXSW in Austin, Tex. We're making our initial sojourn to the festival and are so pleased to see there will be a strong Seattle contingent joining us in Austin this year.

Right on the heels of the announcement that the Mars Volta was added to the Sasquatch lineup, and right before tickets go on sale this Saturday, the three-day music festival has seen fit to delineate who will be playing on which day:

That long-awaited EP from Seattle's Fleet Foxes is out, a few months in advance of the new album due June-ish. Sun Giant (Sub Pop) provokes something more than cautious optimism on the part of Pitchfork: "It's a sovereign work: a statement EP, supremely crafted and confident." An 8.7! It's also just $5, mp3 download or CD.

After months of wild speculation, the official 2008 Sasquatch lineup has finally been announced:

The UK's Guardian Unlimited spoke to Seattle's Fleet Foxes (thanks, CHS) ("a group whose unique sound is hymnal and baroque, with mandolins and banjos and extraordinary vocal harmonies") and got the scoop on Seattle's development opportunity.

As ChrisB of Three Imaginary Girls points out, losing your job sucks. Losing a job that meant a lot to you sucks more. And losing all that during the holidays? Well that just blows a goat.