Author: Kevin Heffernan

The Woods are Calling, and Fleet Foxes will guide you home

After slamming all the windows shut last night and debating whether to turn on the heater for the season, this morning’s 52 degrees, rain and clouds reinforced that familiar feeling into us all: No, not a craving for some pumpkin spice sugar syrup in my hot milk, but to sing in harmony at the top of my lungs with my old pals from 2008, Fleet Foxes.

Early in 2008, the Sun Giant EP was released and shook indie rock airwaves, where listeners couldn’t quite put a finger on the harmonious lyrics straight out of 19th century correspondences. The album got on the radar of a few Pitchfork surfers before it was followed by the Fleet Foxes which put them on the map of indie, alternative, folk and bluegrass fans alike.

2008’s Fleet Foxes featured an unknown drummer in Joshua Tillman, today’s Father John Misty (transitioning his brand back over to “J. Tillman” today).

More long hair and scraggly beards belonging to Casey Wescott, Christian Wargo, Craig Curran, Skye Skjelset, Nicolas Peterson and Robin Pecknold, rounded out the band that sounded straight out of the “Blue Ridge Mountains, Over in Tennessee,” but were actually all hailing from Seattle, WA.

Multiple mandolins, drum kits, keyboards and guitars were consistently overpowered by smooth, harmonious voices recorded to sound as if they were creeping through the woods, just out of site.

It is the soundtrack of the harvest, long hikes through the woods, cabins in the Adirondacks, rotting leaves, and the last bit of Halloween magic that can still raise the hair on the back of your neck at night.

The band has rotated members in and out and their sound has evolved over time, but every time the clouds turn gray and you zip your coat up a bit higher to your neck, every time “You run with the devil,” you can push play on an album that will flood in all the best fall memories you’ve had over the last 10 years.