Without Question, THE Best CD/Album/Download of 2008

Are there albums or songs that return you to a certain season? Music that literally sounded like summertime or autumn? I'm happy to report I've found as great a wintertime soundtrack as your senses could ever enjoy. "Fleet Foxes" (on Sub Pop), from the Seattle band of the same name, is as fresh and as crisp a collection of songs as the January air whisking through the Pacific firs along the Cascades. The Foxes are a group of close-knit friends who grew up on the music of their parents: The Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Marvin Gaye, CSN&Y, Fairport Convention...and Bach! (Ed. note: THANK YOU, MOMS & DADS) In fact, the acappella-opening tune that initially intrigued me--"White Winter Hymnal"--could lead you to believe it was recorded in a bare tree forest, amid snow drifts and silvery skies. "We try to draw from the traditions of folk music, pop, choral music and gospel, baroque psychedelic, sacred harp singing, West coast music, traditional music from Ireland to Japan and film scores," Fleet Fox Robin Pecknold said. "We've succeeded for ourselves if we've made a song where every instrument is doing something interesting and melodic." When was the last time you heard an artist pledge anything like that? The album is worth the price alone for "Hymnal" and especially "Blue Ridge Mountain," the latter possessing a melodic cornucopia beyond adjectives. Like Goldfrapp's "Felt Mountain" in 2000, "Fleet Foxes" enhances the winter solstice. But, happily, this is a band for all seasons.