Foxing Takes a Poppy Turn and Put It All Together on Draw Down the Moon

The St. Louis band demonstrates how to be radio ready without selling out

Foxing’s Conor Murphy opens Draw Down the Moon, the band’s excellent new album, singing “I feel like a 737, painted over and over until the paint gets too heavy,” over some delicate acoustic guitar work.

It’s an apt metaphor for the St. Louis indie band, who have continually changed their sound throughout the last decade. Bouncing between post-rock, indie, and early aughts emo, Foxing consistently defies expectations. After 2018’s Nearer My God explored more synth-heavy sounds and garnered the most critical acclaim of their career, Foxing is again changing pace with their poppiest and most radio-friendly album.

By their accounts, Draw Down the Moon was not an easy record to write and record, but luckily the new arena-ready sheen strips the heavy paint as Foxing is bound to soar. After losing another band member in long-time guitarist Ricky Sampson, Foxing is now recording as a three-piece which allows for there to be zero fat on this record. Each song is highly catchy, memorable, and well placed.

Foxing has a track record of never doing the expected, and while that opener “737” begins gently, the song turns into a post-hardcore throat shredder. The rest of the record never returns to this heavy of a moment, but it’s a statement to the diversity of the sounds explored over forty minutes.

Fading in is “Go Down Together,” which has the band ready for the indie charts and is one of the year's best singles. It’s a simple song compared to the rest of Draw Down the Moon but is an earworm that floats somewhere in the first decade of the century between MGMT and when Death Cab for Cutie was tolerable.

“Beacons” is another first-rate stadium driver that builds into a horn-laden finish before the fuzzed-out title track hooks onto your brain like welcomed barnacles. Murphy’s vocals step up and down as he sings, “I wanna show you I can keep it all together,” and it’s just as addictive as anything played in the mainstream.

On an album of peak moments, it’s hard to pick favorite songs, but the shuffling beats of “Where the Lightning Strikes Twice” are what keeps me coming back. At this point in the record, it’s expected that the chorus will be catchy, but there’s some Queen flirting hair metal shredding that makes it the most fun Foxing song in memory.

“Bialystok” is another fantastic example of how Foxing can incorporate downer lyrics into memorable melodies that have you moving your feet until you listen closely to the devastation. “At Least We Found the Floor” is a welcomed pause and another lyrical stinger. There aren’t too many stripped-back acoustic and vocal songs I revisit these days, but there’s an identifiable destroying quality to “At Least We Found the Floor” that makes it stand out on an album of in-your-face refrains.

“Cold Blooded” surprises with its Enya referencing lyrics as Murphy sings, “I used to cry to ‘Only Time,’ I forget the last time I tried, I wish that A Day Without Rain would make me feel the same today.” Another song that may be the album highlight is “If I Believed In Love.” Starting with synth-driven verses in which Murphy recalls Hamilton Leithauser’s vocal stylings, the track opens up into an emotional shredder.

“Speak With the Dead” served as the lead single when Draw Down the Moon was announced, which seemed odd as it doesn’t match the rest of the record, but fits in wonderfully with context as the closer. Clocking in at seven minutes, the song is a gut punch as Murphy reaches out to those he has lost over the years. John Hellwig’s drums are a crucial piece to this record, and the song also allows him to open up with some compelling pieces.

More often than not, a poppy outing can turn away a band’s fanbase. Foxing seems to have no interest in that as this album toes the line of their earlier work while also opening them up to new listeners who might not have considered or heard of them in the past.

Foxing considered calling it quits during the process of this record, but after listening to Draw Down the Moon multiple times, I’m relieved they didn’t. Often a band’s best work comes from working through their darkest times, and Foxing proves they are no exception with this masterpiece.

Draw Down the Moon is available now on Grand Paradise / Hopeless Records.

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