2011- 15 SINGLES
*2*—FLEET FOXES-HELPLESSNESS BLUES
After their breakout album in 2008 I was prepared to be disappointed with Helplessness Blues. I thought I had reached the saturation point for emo-indie folk groups. Apparently not. This song takes all the kindergarten preciousness of the “you are a snowflake” pablum we’ve force-fed our young for the past twenty years and declares being a “functioning cog in some great machinery serving something beyond me” might actually be a good thing. That’s a radical though for hipsters. It doesn’t stand.
The final lines are about a longing for a life of agrarian simplicity. Of course. We’re back to The Romantics. The whole song changes on this notion. It’s soft, full of hope and love. It’s a dream. We all need dreams, no matter how helpless.
