Album: Dealer - Foxing

Words: Jordan Gorsuch

“The content of ‘Weave’ is kind of like an answer to what ‘The Albatross’ was…It’s intended to put ‘The Albatross’ to bed in a way” bassist Josh Coll said about Foxing’s second single from their highly anticipated album, Dealer. The song features direct references to the album, and sets the stage for the entire album’s lyrical premise: moving on.

Foxing aren’t just moving on from the explosive bouts of emotion and un-restrained, personal subject matters that were found on their debut. Every song on the album features an anecdote or a larger story built around the ideas of forgetting, forgiving, and disappearing. Even the two instrumental tracks on the album sound like nothing found on The Albatross. Foxing was very focused on creating lush, atmospheric soundscapes, incorporating synths and piano into their typically guitar-centered approach.

Stand-out track “Indica” finds singer Conor Murphy singing in a calm reverie about parent’s nightmares for their dead children, accompanied by gentle guitar plucks. It’s a chilling contrast, a man so broken by his acts of war, yet so able to sing calmly with such clarity. “Do I haunt their parent’s dreams? And in so, am I summarized by sounds of young one’s screams?” Murphy croons while a piano coda plays out.

Violins swim lovingly over the piano-led instrumental, “Winding Cloth.” This bleeds into “Redwoods,” a beautiful song focused on memories of home, wishing that you can find love and set down roots without having to leave.

“Glass Coughs” follows the lead of the third track on the album, a more straightforward, cathartic song about faith in God and the shame that can result in the fallout. The drums are less reserved, the two guitars sound simply uplifting when they fly in the chorus. Murphy’s vocals eschew the former restraint, allowing himself to give the performance screaming girth.

Overall, this a more cohesive, mature album than its predecessor. It’s also an album that is layered so densely that it takes multiple listens to parse through it all. Which is great, because the lyrics resonate on repeat listens, and with these feelings of regret and a desire to move on, sometimes it’s good to sit and wrestle with a record for a good while. The themes of sexuality, faith, and self-paralysis culminate in the final, somber track.

“When it’s three on a match. The Lord won’t let me in. I’m survived by the weight of my own sins,” Murphy sings on the concluding track. The album focuses so much on learning to move on, but sometimes all that growth leads us to the same place.

Dealer is out now on Triple Crown Records.