Concert Review: Fleet Foxes Are LOVED At Bric Celebrate Brooklyn!

It is always amazing to go to a concert and feel the crowd’s fandom. Enter Prospect Park Bandshell for another BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! show, I knew I would get greatness when seeing Fleet Foxes. What I did not expect was so much love!

People LOVE Fleet Foxes. Yet, it is not in an “I love that song” or “This band is my jam” kind of way. It is in a “Fleet Foxes are the only ones that speak to my soul!” kind of way, and as I was moved as I looked at the crowd smile, close their eyes, and sing out loud with tracks like “Tiger Mountain Peasant Song”, “Your Protector”, and “Helplessness Blues”. By their titles alone, you can see that these are not simple chords and melodies. These are opuses that do not aim for repetitive hooks and clear lyricism. Fleet Foxes creates their verses as if they are in a poetry competition with greats like Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, and Allen Ginsberg. As seen in my review of their most recent album, Crack-Up, Fleet Foxes aim for the complexity of music as much as they aim for the complexity of humanity. Each song such as, “Fool’s Errand”, “He Doesn’t Know Why”, and “White Winter Hymnal” were beautiful, spiritual soundscapes with a shared theme: sadness. They all held verses that sung about feeling robbed by life or pressured by this “cosmic force” to be someone you are not, but have no clue over who is the “someone” you want to be. Hence, why I was so fascinated to hear people sing along to these raw feelings that even I feel, and treat Robin Pecknold as if he has always been the voice in their head and heart.

Last night, Robin Pecknold could do no wrong. He has a voice made for folkish blues and beauty, and every time he tweaked a note or leapt in pitch immediate cheers followed from the attentive audience. They were looking to him and the grand orchestra that is Fleet Foxes to be the night of happiness and healing. I kid you not; people were genuinely elated, and it was the first time, in a long time, when the current state of the world felt locked out of a concert. Fleet Foxes music was a sheer reminder that being human is hard enough, which is why society can feel like an added burden. Yet, Fleet Foxes is all about the individual journey through this universe we call life, and on August 1, and again today, hundreds gathered to feel that universe in music. With colors and shapes outlined behind them and floating on screen, Fleet Foxes played a near two hour show that could have been a minute with how gorgeously brisk it felt. For More Information On Fleet Foxes Click Here.