Saw new Sub Pop signing Fleet Foxes at a Brooklyn Vegan shindig at Emo’s IV on Thursday afternoon. Until about an hour before the show, I’d had no idea that Christian Wargo (of Crystal Skulls, a band I have some history with) was at all involved. (He plays bass and some guitar, and lends harmony vocals to the proceedings).
A fair amount of the press I’ve seen for these guys references My Morning Jacket. There’s a similar sprawling feel of Americana gone ambient, but given Fleet Foxes’ use of harmonies and the sometimes elliptical structures of their songs, I’d be more tempted to reference them as contemporaries of Grizzly Bear than anyone. Though there’s an element to their music that almost feels sacred as well: they’re songs that (at least musically) could work as well in a rock club as in an isolated roadside church, a hundred miles from anything.