What Does the Fox Say?

While out birding sometime probably in May last year at one of my favorite wooded spots, I noticed movement on the hill in the woods ahead of me. There were four or five red fox kits chasing each other up and down a deer path halfway up the small ridge ahead of me. One or two scooted in and back out of what appeared to be a den there, and that’s when I noticed staring back at me, one of their parents. I was quite a distance away and had just crossed the stream below the hill, but she (I’ll say she, because I just sensed it was a protective mama) was staring at me staring at her through my binoculars.

I nodded my head as if to say, “sorry to bother you, mam,” and moved on. Though I looked for them later through the summer, I never saw them again. I’ve had quite a few good fox sightings in my life, but that was one of the coolest.

So, it was a broad theme this week, animals, either in the band’s name or in the title of the song, but what I found weird was that it was seriously difficult to find a women’s group named after an animal. There were the Pussycat Dolls, but I have them in mind for something else sometime soon. Kate Bush sings of going to sleep and dreaming of sheep and Tori Amos even has a song about oysters, but the pickings were slim for female related material this week. I guess men really are more like animals.

By the way, I apologize for this song if you haven’t heard it before, and if you have, I apologize even more profusely, but what a great finale for a week on animals, right? I had no idea where this song came from back in 2013 or 14, but suddenly everyone was singing in this annoying high pitch, “What does the FOX say?” At the time I couldn’t understand how this tune climbed the charts. It had to be a joke, right?

Well, yes, David. Yes, it was a joke, and that’s why it took off. I see that now that I’ve finally sat down and watched this goofy video and had a good giggle to myself. It was a busy week, I hope you have a lovely weekend ahead of you. Who knows what our next “accidental” theme will be on Jeff’s Song of the Day. Here’s the comedy duo Ylvis singing “The Fox.”

White Winter Hymnal

We’ve had Foreigner with “Cold as Ice” and the Moody Blues with “Nights in White Satin,” so maybe we can stretch this into a theme week. Something like ‘Odd band names with songs that are tangentially reminiscent of winter and snow.’ Why not? If you enjoy these, please like and share. I’d love to tell my brother that his song of the day legacy continues with lots of new followers.

I had heard of the group Fleet Foxes, but I hadn’t really listened to any of their work until last night. Far Out Magazine calls today’s song of the day a good place to start if you are new to the band’s work. And what’s not to like about the band’s name? They say they had no real reason to name it that but they liked the alliteration.

In Rolling Stone, lead singer Robin Pecknold said that while the song had something to do with friends moving on, disappearing from his life over the years, but in other places he has said that the lyrics were somewhat meaningless. I think they hit just in the right spot between specificity and ambiguity, so that the listener can make the meaning into whatever they need it to mean, applying it to their own memory and experience, and Pecknold did say that he wrote his songs, including Winter Hymnal, from experience.

If you want to dig into some of the meanings behind their name and this song, here’s a little collection on Song Facts from other articles that talk about that. Ultimately though, while we can appreciated knowing what’s under the surface, I like this about it: I don’t need to know what’s under the snow covered hills to enjoy the beauty of them. Sometimes songs and poems can be an experience like that.

I chose a live performance to share with you. This is from when the tune first came out in 2008. Apparently, someone in the audience at this venue in San Francisco had already heard the song online and was asking them to play it.