Foxburrows

Horse Thief, Deerpeople, Wildings, Moongiant … something about the Oklahoma sun and soil inspires as high quality, nature-leaning indie rock as you’ll find anywhere across the country. Foxburrows could easily be the next name to slide into that fold, showing a similar penchant for skying melodies, wormy guitar notes, terrestrial bass hooks, watery tones and summery flourishes. They subvert the typical tropes with some math rock undertones and emo sentiments, leading to moments — like those found in “Elementary Rock for the Masses” — that are as strong as anything Gorilla Manor … not bad for a debut EP.

Starting off as just Fox in 2013, the Oklahoma City outfit featuring Cody Anderson (guitar, vocals), Boone Brady (vocals, percussion), Nick Nathan (keyboards, percussion), Collin Spriggs (bass, vocals), Blair Smith (drums, vocals) and Derek Waas (guitar) is playing a pair of Norman shows in the next week: a free concert with Chase Kerby and Annie Oakley on Friday and again next Thursday with Milk Jr. and The Hitt Boyz (who will release a split EP with Foxburrows this summer).

Ahead of their busy week, Foxburrows talked to Oxford Karma about how the band came to be, Slayer, woodland critters and covering Weezer.

Oxford Karma: Was there an idea for what kind of music you wanted to make at the outset of the band, or was it just an organic process? Along that line, how do you feel you’ve evolved from where you started out to where you are now?

Cody Anderson: [Waas] and I started writing music in high school together, and we brought a few of our old ideas to the table for something to begin with. After the first batch of songs we started with, it was definitely more of an organic process involving everybody. Although the new music we have been writing is still upbeat, it definitely has a darker feel overall and is not nearly as straight forward.

Collin Spriggs: [Brady], [Smith] and I have been playing together for around five years. This has made it easier for us to play off each other as well as expressing musical opinions.

OK: You can hear a little bit of everything in your music. Definitely some pure indie rock and psych folk … but then also some math rock and post-rock in there, too. What would you say are collectively some of the bands you all are most inspired and influenced by?

Blair Smith: The biggest influences on all of us have been Broken Social Scene, Manchester Orchestra, Radiohead, Explosions in the Sky, Great Big Pile of Leaves and Dear and the Headlights. All of us have brought our own tastes in music that have worked their way into the sound of the band.

Anderson: I definitely hear influences of Deerhunter and Minus the Bear in our music. Derek isn’t here to say this but … he loves Slayer and Toto.

OK: You released an EP earlier this year. What about that album are you most proud of and pleased with, at least at this point in time?

Anderson: For our first official release, I am glad that we were able to show a little bit of diversity in our songwriting, even if those songs do not reflect on our newer material. We were lucky enough to record with Joe LeMay out of Oklahoma City, and he did an awesome job producing our first EP.

OK: The Woodland Creatures title … is that a nod to South Park or just adorable wildlife in general?

Boone Brady: The title came from my reply to where our original band name, Fox, came from on KSBI’s Oklahoma Live!: ‘They’re just simple woodland creatures.”

Smith: From now on, we will start telling people it came from South Park. That sounds better.
OK: What do you think was the theme of the songs on that EP, be that in terms of subject matter or just the general mood of the songs?

Brady: Lyrically, most of the songs on the EP were somewhat dark. The song “Degs” was essentially about clawing and biting your way out of a pit. That being said, I didn’t want to wallow in that feeling. Most of the songs have a sort of “something worth fighting for” message in them.

Spriggs: Musically, the feel of most of the songs is upbeat and controlled. It contrasts well with Boone’s lyrics, giving rise to songs that offer both depth and accessibility.

OK: Have you been working on new material? If so, how does it compare to what we hear on the EP?

Nick Nathan: We’ve been working on a ton of new songs, as well as fine-tuning songs that we currently play live, but are not on the Woodland Creatures EP. The newer material is definitely a little more dissonant in terms of overall composition; our newest songs have been a little more bass-driven.

Spriggs: With the addition of [Nathan], we have been able to explore new avenues and timbres that were not previously possible. He has brought a fresh sound to the group, allowing for exploration regarding orchestration.

OK: When do you hope to have another album/EP out?

Anderson: We are currently recording with Joe LeMay again, and our plan is to have our first full-length album out early this fall. Also, this is our first time to announce anything, but we are releasing a split EP with The Hitt Boyz this summer that will have new material from both of our bands. We are stoked.

OK: What sorts of plans do you have for the rest of 2015?

Smith: Our main priority this year is to finish up our album and keep on writing new material. After everything is released, we would like to play a few shows out of state to support the new music.

Anderson: Last year, we were lucky enough to do a short stint with our friends, The River Monks from Des Moines, regionally last summer after we released our EP. I definitely would like to take the time to get out of state again after we have our album finished.

Smith: Also, by the end of 2015, we’ll eventually convince [Anderson] that covering “Say It Ain’t So” by Weezer is a good idea. - Oxford Karma

Tame contains some rather heavy themes within its layered swirl of clean-cut guitar lines, but it's not readily apparent from its exterior. The Oklahoma City band's impressive full-length debut features minimal artwork that only provides abstract hints of its contents, while song titles range from taciturn to jokey.

"Pelican't," which has both of these cryptic qualities, features bright, mid-tempo indie rock guitars, drums, and piano swimming in major chords. By contrast, however, it opens with the plaintive line "I lost my place in these astral planes" and continues to more imagery-filled lyrics like "Tired of this rock, you're gonna watch me drown / And turn and run, but don’t make a sound."

Gradually, tangles with depression, anxiety, and existentialism reveal themselves to be a running theme, often with tones that embody a lighter form of introspection. It isn't simply an offset for its own sake, though. The glimmering musical treatment plays like a constant light at the end of the tunnel, and the transfixing beauty that is molded into the project gives a sense of purpose to a direction-seeking narrator. The music tells a side that the words don't alone convey.

The lead vocalist of Foxburrows tasked with presenting these words rarely sings with harmonies, and his voice sounds fairly untouched by studio wizardry. He gives a natural, gravitational performance that tends more toward trepidation than gloom. Although he makes use of melismas, he doesn't showboat. Rather, his unpredictable use of vocal runs and vibrato play as improvisations that echo the album’s wanderings from safe, secure song structure.

If any track adheres to traditional pop writing, it's the catchy standout "Waves." It has a consistent melody that carries from verse to chorus and back again for the first half or so. Even with a chorus as wordy as "It's comin' in waves and under my tongue / Is all that remains of the source thereof," the cut feels more grounded than many of its neighbors. After those first three minutes, though, lies an instrumental stretch that never makes its way back to its foundation. Instead, it births an impassioned new guitar solo out of a soft, contented womb.

The centerpiece of Tame is "Fourvel," which wears another inside joke title and apparently refers to a character from TV program Comedy Bang! Bang! Go figure, then, that this should boast some of the album's most directly relatable and soul-bearing moments. The line "It drags you down, you cannot fake it anymore," for instance, doesn't blur itself in fancy wording, and "I will fall / like broken glass that rains down on my street" chooses a simile where much of the album prefers metaphor. This track also features a mid-song change. Notably, the drums keep the first part of the song fairly antsy, but as the vocals begin building on a dynamic refrain, the rhythm section settles into a groove that feels something like grim acceptance.

In a smart move of tracking, the downbeat ending to "Fourvel" is immediately brightened by "Elementary Math Rock for the Masses." This track brings sleigh bells and glockenspiel into the mix, and toward the end, it counters some distorted guitar work with light piano. This is one of two cuts brought in from the band’s Woodland Creatures EP released in 2014; the other is "Degs," which also has a little guitar distortion, a sound largely absent from the rest of the record.

The variety of sounds woven through Tame are often so subtle that the album can ring a bit one-note despite them. The abundant guitar pedals make for plenty of interesting tones, but the songs sometimes bleed together because of how atmospheric they all are. The frequent lack of distinct melodies, too, contribute to a less conscious listen. This leaves the album often relying on its overall sound, which is admittedly not all that different from other indie rock bands. A more overt use of diversity in tone and instrumentation would probably make for a more dynamic LP, especially should the lead vocalist venture further from the comfort zone of his midrange.

These are fairly small points of personal taste, though, and incorporating some of that would take away from the album's stream of consciousness. For a major debut intent on establishing a sound, this release is solid, and the lead vocal stylings and lyrical content set the band apart in a good, interesting way. As a bonus, the album doesn't rely on thick reverb to convey its distance. Unlike the band's EP, this iteration knows that the songs stand on their own in this regard and are best left sonically unclouded.

In the sense that Tame is meant to be mined gradually with multiple listens, the densely-ringed tree print album art suddenly makes for an appropriate association. Like the tree, the album runs deep and is well cultivated, making for an experience that's contemplative, authentic, and easily one of the best local rock records so far this year. - Cellar Door Music Group