Foxygen – …And Star Power //
Foxygen released their third long player in three years on October 14th. But is their newest record, …And Star Power (Jagjaguwar), any good?
Leave your own quick review in the comments below for a chance to win two tickets to one of our SF Shows of the Week (options below)…
Read the BAM Team’s reviews of Foxygen’s latest, and contact us if you’re interested in writing for Showbams.
BAM TEAM RATING:
Foxygen’s sophomore release …And Star Power finds the band transporting their weirdo AM radio sound into new cosmic territory, but ultimately getting stuck between stations in the process. Starting off with the appropriately named A-side “The Hits”, Foxygen crafts some of the best warped, soft gaze pop this side of Ariel Pink with songs like “How Can You Really”. However for the majority of the record, Foxygen forgoes the weirdo lyricism and just-weird-enough-to-work pop sensibilities that made their prior two releases so memorable. Foxygen shows off their adept ability to recreate the sounds of iconic, off kilter pop of yesteryear on songs like “Hot Summer”, but rarely pull out any engaging song structure to give skeletons to their limp amoebas of psych sound. Unfortunately, Foxygen’s …And Star Power ends up getting lost on a less interesting pirate station than finding home between forgotten hits of the past and a late night broadcast of Coast-to-Coast. -John Venanzi
3 BAMS // Best Track: “How Can You Really”
If you would have told me that Foxygen would never put out another album and slip into obscurity, I would have completely believed you. Edgier and more punk rock than We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic, Foxygen follows their excellent 2013 album admirably here with a washed out, seemingly Velvet Underground-inspired album. This leads to a gripe with the album: sometimes it just feels like you’re listening to a sum of influences and it loses freshness after repeat plays. The album surely drags at times (24 track albums usually do), though there’s nothing glaringly bad about it. Hopefully these guys stick around, tone down the on-stage theatrics and keep making albums. -Steven Wandrey
3 BAMS // Top Track: “Flowers”
Striving to strike a balance between polished pop and eclectic experimentalism, Foxygen’s latest album …And Star Power falls short of hitting the mark. Though I don’t know if the intent is there, the album plays off much like a rock-opera, but still lacks a level of flow that should go along with it. Nothing on the album really grabs me, and I’m not all that sure I would want to listen to this passively or actively. A few stand out tracks unfortunately cannot save this album. -Andrew Pohl
2 BAMS // Top Track: “How Can You Really”
WIN 2 FREE SHOW TICKETS BY SHARING YOUR OWN QUICK REVIEW:
Leave your own quick review below as a comment. Write no more than five sentences, give your own BAM Ranking and pick your top song. If you’d like to win two tickets to one of these shows, simply write the name of the show you’d like to win under your review. View our SF Shows of the Week.
• Rubblebucket: October 15th (WED) @ The Independent
• J. Roddy Walston and The Business: October 17th (FRI) @ The Independent
• Sinkane: October 19th (SUN) @ The Independent
awesome band live