BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//wp-events-plugin.com//7.2.3.1//EN TZID:America/New_York X-WR-TIMEZONE:America/New_York BEGIN:VEVENT UID:151994@kingstonhappenings.org DTSTART;TZID=America/New_York:20250926T190000 DTEND;TZID=America/New_York:20250926T230000 DTSTAMP:20250929T140545Z URL:https://kingstonhappenings.org/events/foxwarren-assembly/ SUMMARY:Foxwarren @ Assembly DESCRIPTION:No one in Foxwarren has ever made a record quite like 2. The Ca nadian quintet\, built on 20 years of friendship\, ostensibly plays folk m usic\, where warm tones and cantering rhythms buoy songs of characters wre stling with existential quandaries inside of twilit vocals. But after tour ing their lauded 2018 self-titled debut\, Foxwarren decided to do it all d ifferently\, eventually dropping the familiar band-in-a-room routine to in stead plug those songs\, and various other sounds into a sampler. The resu lt is mesmerizing and uncanny\, an album that traces two sides of a relati onship through 37 minutes of collage art that aspires to “sound best bla sting out your car window” as put by singer Andy Shauf.\n\nTo understand how Foxwarren got here\, it’s best to understand where they started. Du ring the last decade\, Andy Shauf has become known as a uniquely imaginati ve and precise storyteller - a perpetually restless songwriter and musicia n\, always using some fresh fascination\, skill\, or concept as the cataly st for albums he would write\, play\, and produce almost entirely by himse lf. These ever-evolving interests are evident from 2016’s The Party thro ugh to 2023’s Norm. But before Shauf’s solo acclaim\, he was a member of Foxwarren\, which initially consisted of Shauf\, fraternal rhythm secti on Avery and Darryl Kissick\, and guitarist Dallas Bryson.\n\nFoxwarren’ s debut arrived almost an entire decade after the formation of the band. I t was released in late 2018 on ANTI-\, and quickly became a fan favorite. They found momentum through solid reviews and beloved live shows\, immedia tely overcoming any suggestion whatsoever that this was just a side projec t. Multi-instrumental ace Colin Nealis—a member of Shauf’s touring ban d—officially joined Foxwarren after their summer touring in 2019. Riding a crest of enthusiasm\, the band headed into the studio in October of the same year\, hoping to cut a half-dozen songs for a follow-up rather quick ly. Given a little distance\, though\, the songs felt flat.\n\nSo Foxwarre n opted to try something entirely new: In their own home studios across fo ur provinces\, all five members would upload song ideas\, melodic phrases\ , or rhythmic bits to a shared folder. In Toronto\, Shauf would then plug these into a sampler and construct songs from the fragments supplied by hi s bandmates\, leaning into classic hip-hop techniques and musique concrèt e alike as unlikely lodestars. Foxwarren would convene at weekly online me etings\, offering long-distance suggestions about which way a song might s hift.\n\nIt was neither a fast nor an easy process\, but 2 became an uncan ny revelation for Foxwarren\, a rock band allowing itself to be sampled in order to become something else. They warped and pushed the florid folk-ro ck of their past until it evolved into a song cycle about the vagaries of love\, where voices sampled from the past commingled with songs that spark led with the power of their collective imagination in the present. It is a fun and surprising record\, where boundaries between genre and song are c onstantly blurred.\n\nAvery Kissick kickstarted the process\, uploading a mound of drum takes for the others to plunder. Bryson used one such fragme nt as the basis for a tune that would eventually be called “Say It.” W hen Shauf heard Bryson’s melodic vocal turn\, he was inspired\, lifting the melody and placing it over broad new bass notes dissolving between pia no stabs\, singing of romantic doldrums in a tone rising just above a whis per. Bryson completed the song with a halting guitar solo\, suggesting the search for some new language.\n\nThe band upped the ante by weaving a tro ve of found-sound conversations between two lovers into the songs\, inters titial bits that advance the story but also raise intriguing questions abo ut where songs begin and end\, how one melody might fade into another. The se aren’t chances supposed “folk-rock records” take\; they delight a nd so animate 2\, always prompting you to wonder how this story might evol ve from here.\n\nThere is something uncanny about the feeling of these son gs\, the way bits recorded in different home studios amplify your attentio n\, looping and interlocking. But the true connective tissue is the genero us and gentle way Foxwarren’s 2 moves with melody. The woodwinds\, piano \, and drums of opener “Dance” intertwine like some soft-pop fantasy\, a perfect platform for an endearing plea for shared connection. “Yvonne ” is a compulsory study of love’s strange spell\, Shauf setting the sc ene above a loping Laurel Canyon rhythm. The vocal harmonies hitting the s tring section feels like watching the sun rise in someone else’s eyes.\n \nFoxwarren’s quest for levity is evident in the song “Deadhead\,” w hich somehow moves from an MF Doom-like pitch-shifted sample to a line-dan ce guitar lick to honeyed country-rock harmonies of the titular band all i n three minutes. There are darting flutes\, mangled electronics\, and meti culous snippets of rhythm\, all expertly placed to illustrate the song’s emotional tumult. “I won’t stop dancing\,” is exactly how it feels. \n\nA bit of borrowed dialogue offers the title phrase of “Listen2me\, ” before a guitar riff and bounding rhythm cut in to repeat themselves\, spinning around again and again while Shauf relays a loud-mouthed lover ’s quarrel—who is paying attention to whom\, who is interesting or exh austing. And then there’s the way “Serious” plods on purpose\, exten ding the bickering contest between lovers. This inevitable moment unspools into fitful samples and slow drones\, the disorienting end of the affair\ , at least for now.\n\nBy himself\, Shauf has already had a stellar career \, his reputation built not only by the sweetness of his melodies and shar pness of his words but also his inability to rest with past success. Foxwa rren\, especially here\, is a crucial part of that ongoing process\, but 2 represents something even more significant—five friends now nearing the end of their second decade making music together\, pushing against what t hey’ve learned how to do in order to venture somewhere new. It is the so und of friends who trust each other\, cutting themselves loose from their past and their preconceptions to have some fun with a sampler and the very idea of songs. ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://kingstonhappenings.org/wp-content/upload s/2025/09/495538926_122160516896562532_8921351278618677708_n.jpg CATEGORIES:@Featured,@Newsletter,Music,Nightlife and entertainment LOCATION:Assembly\, 236 Wall St. 3rd Floor\, KINGSTON\, NY\, 12401\, United States GEO:41.931738;-74.018648 X-APPLE-STRUCTURED-LOCATION;VALUE=URI;X-ADDRESS=236 Wall St. 3rd Floor\, KI NGSTON\, NY\, 12401\, United States;X-APPLE-RADIUS=100;X-TITLE=Assembly:ge o:41.931738,-74.018648 END:VEVENT BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:America/New_York X-LIC-LOCATION:America/New_York BEGIN:DAYLIGHT DTSTART:20250309T030000 TZOFFSETFROM:-0500 TZOFFSETTO:-0400 TZNAME:EDT END:DAYLIGHT END:VTIMEZONE END:VCALENDAR