Fox Run Sounds and LB [Lars Bygdén] Reviewed

Fox Run Sounds – Shake a Shoe

If you’re like me, the day rarely gets off to a perfect start. You wake up too late, get too little caffeine, and remember all of the things that you should’ve remembered to do the day before. 

And, if that makes you feel ashamed of yourself, you might be right. There are people who get it perfectly. They get the perfect amount of sleep, eat enough protein to start the day and walk into their office with a smile and fresh energy. 

Those people may be the apple of the eye of experts on optimisation. But do they have the misery and regrets? Do they have any of that sweet melancholy that makes you want to try better? Certainly, they wouldn’t be able to pen a song quite like Fox Run Sounds.

There’s power in regrets and fears. And there are plenty of reasons to try, even if it’s to fail when it comes to matters of the heart. Fox Run Sounds’ immensely tender, and personal “Shake a Shoe,” is music for all the people who reached out for the Heavens and got nothing in return. It’s amazing to consider that suffering can produce the most beautiful songs. 

LB [Lars Bygdén] – War

I didn’t pay enough attention in school, but I can distinctly remember a teacher telling us that, in fact, the atrocious wars of the 20th Century may have been a blessing in disguise. Those events were so horrific, so insulting to the very human condition, that the teacher argued, there was no way they could ever be repeated in the future history of the world. 

And, while I am sure your teachers may have said something similar, it turns out that they were wrong. Recent years have seen not just an increase in wars, but a disgusting embrace by the Western world of military conflicts. Words like “heroic” and “brave” get tossed around when talking about this. And, if it’s enough to make you sick to your stomach, you feel just the same as Lars Bygdén.

Bygdén is repelled by the military-industrial complex and by the dirty business it keeps peddling. “War” is a protest song. But unlike many of the tunes you may have heard on the topic recently, this doesn’t include shouting or sloganeering. Nah, this is an old-fashioned protest song. It’s a sound that is almost tender, and a mounrful meditation on the state of a world being bled dry by war-mongering opportunists. May the country-rock-favouring Swede songwriter inspire many!