Foxygen

Foxygen began as the classic rock-leaning experimental pop project of multi-instrumentalists Sam France and Jonathan Rado. The two grew up in the Los Angeles suburb of Westlake Village and began the band in 2005 as 15-year-old high-school freshmen. Apart from sharing a voracious love of classic albums from the Ramones to Led Zeppelin, the two bonded over a shared inspiration after watching the rockumentary Dig together. Learning that Anton Newcombe, mastermind behind the Brian Jonestown Massacre and key subject of the film, played up to 75 different instruments on his band's albums inspired the youths to learn as many different instruments as possible themselves. The pair worked on about ten home-recorded, self-distributed albums in their high-school days, eventually parting ways when it was time to go off to college. France went west to Olympia and Rado to New York, and they both played in other bands, feeling mostly unsatisfied with their new projects. France made a brief trek out to the East Coast in 2011 and Foxygen constructed the schizophrenic and Stones-steeped Take the Kids Off Broadway. The album saw release in the summer of 2012 on mega indie label Jagjaguwar. A more realized full-length followed in early 2013 in the form of the Richard Swift-produced We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic. The album was met with great reviews and Foxygen soon found themselves touring nonstop internationally, with France developing a reputation for antagonistic and sometimes violent stage antics. Foxygen followed up their critically lauded first few albums in late 2014 with the densely stuffed double album ...And Star Power.