SONG OF THE DAY
“Your Protector” by Fleet Foxes (Fleet Foxes [self-titled album], Bella Union/ Sub Pop, 2008). Written by Robin Pecknold.
INTERESTING FACTS (a la wikipedia)
– Fleet Foxes is a Seattle-based indie folk band.
– The band came to prominence in 2008 with the release of their second EP, Sun Giant, and their debut full length album Fleet Foxes. Both Sun Giant and their eponymous debut album received much critical praise and reviewers often noted their use of refined lyrics and vocal harmonies.
– The quintet describes its music as “baroque harmonic pop jams”.
– Robin Pecknold and Skyler Skjelset both attended Lake Washington High School in Kirkland, a suburb of Seattle, and soon became close friends. Pecknold and Skjelset bonded over a mutual appreciation of Bob Dylan and Neil Young and began making music together. Their parents influenced their musical tastes early on — Skjelset’s mother Peggi was a keen listener of both Bob Dylan and Hank Williams while Pecknold’s father Greg was a member of The Fathoms, a local 1960s soul group. The two were interested in the achievements of Dylan and Brian Wilson and realized the importance of practicing music from a young age.
– Originally going by the name “Pineapple”, a name clash with another local band prompted a change and Pecknold decided upon “Fleet Foxes”, suggesting that it was “evocative of some weird English activity like fox hunting”.
– Their debut full length album Fleet Foxes received four stars from Rolling Stone, who compared it to the likes of the Beach Boys, Animal Collective, and Crosby, Stills & Nash, and a 9.0 out of 10 in a review by Pitchfork Media, as well as sharing the website’s Album Of The Year rank with the Sun Giant EP.
– The Guardian was particularly complimentary, awarding the album five stars and declaring it “a landmark in American music, an instant classic.”
– The album achieved an average rating of 87/100 from 30 critic reviews on aggregator website Metacritic.
– While the group enjoyed moderate success in the United States, Fleet Foxes was better received in Europe, selling over 200,000 copies in the first five months following its release. The sales were matched with critical plaudits and their debut album won Uncut’s first ever Music Award 2008 prize. Uncut editor Allan Jones said that the album “showed impeccable musicianship, and though you could trace its antecedents, it sounded totally unique. Fleet Foxes was just a glorious debut.”
– At the end of 2008, Fleet Foxes was rated album of the year by Billboard’s Critic’s Choice and in Metacritic’s end of year best album round-up it appeared in 17 lists, topping six of them.
– As Sub Pop had yet to get involved with the band at this point, the recording was funded by the group themselves.
Accolades
| Publication | Country | Accolade | Year | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Amazon.com | U.S. | Best Music of 2008 (Editors’ Pick) | 2008 | #3 |
| Drowned in Sound | UK | 50 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #45 |
| Q | UK | 50 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #2 |
| Rolling Stone | U.S. | 50 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #11 |
| Spin | U.S. | 40 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #5 |
| The Times | UK | 100 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #1 |
| Pitchfork Media | U.S. | 50 Best Albums of the Year | 2008 | #1 |
| Billboard.com | U.S. | 10 Best Albums of the Year (Critics’ Choice) | 2008 | #1 |
| Paste | U.S. | Top 50 Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #6 |
| WERS Boston | U.S. | Top 50 Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #3 |
| Under the Radar | U.S. | Best of 2008 | 2008 | #1 |
| No Ripcord | UK | Top 50 Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #1 |
| Mojo | UK | Top 50 Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #1 |
| Dagbladet | Norway | Top International Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #9 |
| The Know | Australia | Top 10 Albums of 2008 | 2008 | #5 |
| Rolling Stone | U.S. | 100 Best Albums of the Decade | 2009 | #47 |
– The cover art is a detail of the 1559 painting “Netherlandish Proverbs” by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. The cover claimed the Best Art Vinyl Award 2008, an annual award, organized by Artvinyl.com, a company that manufactures display frames for record albums. Pecknold notes:
When you first see that painting it’s very bucolic, but when you look closer there’s all this really strange stuff going on, like dudes defecating coins into the river and people on fire, people carving a live sheep, this weird dude who looks like a tree root sitting around with a dog. There’s all this really weird stuff going on. I liked that the first impression is that it’s just pretty, but then you realize that the scene is this weird chaos. I like that you can’t really take it for what it is, that your first impression of it is wrong.” “There’s a story to each little scene. Which I just felt fitting for that record- dense but unified, not a collage or anything. …It was something you could look at for a long time on a vinyl sleeve and find new little things.
WHERE I HEARD IT
HBO’s Big Love, during Season 4’s dramatic ending brought the track back into my consciousness, but dearest dad had bought me the album way back during 2008 for Christmas (or, “The Christmas Of Dad’s Epic Music Research”). So, yeah, Â I was hip to the Fleet Foxes already.
VIDEO OF THE DAY
Listen to the album version:
And have a ear-gander at this great live version: