I’m sick of gratuitous reverb.
If bands want their music to be ethereal they need to find a better way, because, as it is, they sound like they’re stuck in a cathedral of artistic stagnation.
Which is why when the first track of Fleet Foxes’ “Helplessness Blues” came wafting through my speakers drenched in reverb my stomach began to churn.
The campy effect made me skeptical of what would follow. I can’t help feeling my gut was right.
It’s not that I’m just an insensitive jerk—a rabid opponent of delicate music. I loved Fleet Foxes’ other albums. After hearing “Blue Ridge Mountains” for the first time, I devoured their self-titled releases and the “Sun Giant” EP. I took it as a sign of what to expect from them in the future.
But gone is the fairly minimal, biting blend of folk-rocking energy encircled by Skye Skjelset’s angular guitar lines that graced their first EP. It’s been replaced by atmosphere and production that throws in everything but the kitchen sink, then thinks better of it and tosses it in—pipes and all.
“Bedouin Dress” lilts like Wham’s “Wake me Up Before You Go-Go” in all of the sickeningly saccharine ways expected from that ‘80s pop tune.
Meanwhile, the lyrics sounds like they were manufactured in an overpriced vintage store as the lead singer gawked goo-goo eyed at a hipstress picking out her new patterned dress. His references to a Yeats poem, presumably to make the singers longing more poignant, falls flat and feels forced.
The lyrics don't get better either.
“Why is the earth moving round the sun? / Floating in the vacuum with no purpose, not a one?” runs one of many existential questions in “Blue-Spotted Tail.” I’m not sure. I only know I’ve heard life’s mysteries mused upon in more interesting ways.
Only on “Shrine / An Argument” does “Helplessness Blues” show some teeth. But even here Robin Pecknold’s vocals—at times aggressive—break into dreamy syrup.
Don’t get me wrong, these guys have some musical chops, using interesting change-ups and vocal harmony to great effect. In fact, the vocal harmonies are about the only place this album consistently holds my attention. But I turn my back for a couple of years and they’ve become indie-bopping John Denvers.
Art and music are meant to make mundane subjects sublime. The lyrics of “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” are maddeningly naïve, yet the Beach Boys use those silly little emotions to devastating effect within their composition. Granted, standards set by “Pet Sounds” are pretty high, but I don’t think it’s unfair, given Fleet Foxes’ grand arrangements.
This album confirms that all of the fight and feistiness has been bred out of these foxes since their debut EP. Someone needs to reintroduce these docile kits back to the wild.
They still have a nice Beach Boys vibe to their vocal harmonies and songwriting, but in ways you’ve heard already.
If it weren’t for an indie press snapping at anything that might be shrink-wrapped with the word “quirky” this album would have shipwrecked around track two.
