Short Reviews [The Foxholes - 2020 - "Foxholesque"]

Towards the end of last year, I saw a few people commenting positively about this album, including my great friend Olav Bjornsen who gave it maximum marks. Given that Olav and I have very similar tastes in music, I knew I had to seek this out, and have now been playing it for a while. The band themselves are a trio, comprising Jonah Luke on guitar and vocals, Angel Millan on drums and Max "Mojo" Moritz on bass. Luke is the only constant in the band, who have had nine releases in eleven years, and this is the first time I have heard them. This album contains just five songs, and a total running length of 33 minutes, so quite a short introduction in many ways. The band are from Barcelona, with all lyrics in Spanish, and I must admit I was somewhat surprised as I started to work my way through the album, as I must be missing something as there is little here which makes it stand out. This feels more art rock than progressive rock, as they mix up the likes of The Pineapple Thief with some Seventies references, and I even found myself thinking of Talking Heads at times. There are times when they are strangely compelling, such as during “Vepar”, yet there are others where they seem to be searching for an idea and are not as structured or direct as they could have been. For me there is not enough direction in the album, which often seems to be meandering as opposed to having structure and thought behind it, with even “Vepar” suffering from the same malaise. At times they sit back and let the music drift past, as opposed to grabbing the reins and taking control, and the result for me is something which has some strong elements at times, yet at others drifts along rather aimlessly.