Album Review: Moxie, The Dawn of Motion

Sligo alt trad outfit Moxie have proven quite the musical chameleons since their formation in 2011. The final piece of this musical jigsaw was the addition on lead vocals of Julia Spanu, a French singer/songwriter with Vietnamese and Italian roots, adding a wealth of musical influences to their already modern trad sound.

Their second album, The Dawn Of Motion, sees the sextet combining musical genres like mad scientists let loose in the laboratory, switching from traditional tunes to more polished pop grooves with barely an eyebrow raised, from the soaring ‘Girl From Space’ or the lilting ‘Eyes On Pluto’ to the soulful ‘Kaki’. Album opener and recent single ‘Is Ainm Dom’ is a fun and funky amalgamation of a traditional jig with elements of rock, soul and some further flung influences. On paper, this shouldn’t work at all and yet somehow it does – beautifully, madly so.

Elsewhere, the shift in gears can feel like you’re listening to a compilation rather than one outfit pushing out their musical horizons. My main criticism, though, is that the production is far too safe, hemming in their eclectic madness, rather than letting it run wild and free in the manner that, say, Kíla have mastered. The tunes are there, for sure, but they could do with sounding a little more live and loose.