Just a banjo player serenading a wild fox

Leftover Salmon's Andy Thorn has been uploading videos of him soothing the heart of a wild beast

By Reid McCarter  |  November 12, 2021 | 8:00pm
Music Features Banjo
Just a banjo player serenading a wild fox
“Play some Neil Young!” the fox howls. Screenshot: ThornHub

One of the top genres of internet videos is also one of the simplest: Someone playing music for appreciative animals. This illustrious category includes a man jamming out on saxophone for a field of cows, a rock vocalist parrot, dogs performing impressive dance choreography to bands like Evanescence, and, most recently, the guy who plays banjo for a wild fox.

Andy Thorn is a musician who performs with Leftover Salmon and spends a good amount of his time away from the stage uploading videos (to the well-named YouTube channel, ThornHub) of him serenading a fox.

The most recent of his private shows gives a good indication of what to expect from his videos. In it, he stands in front of an absurdly picturesque mountain backdrop at his Colorado home and plucks away as a fox sits and listens. The animal occasionally gets up and wanders around for a bit, but never strays far from the sounds of the bipedal ape producing strange, enjoyable sounds from its fingertips.

Thorn’s other videos swap out the banjo for a guitar, but follow suit with the one above. He sits on a rock, strums away, and the fox comes over to listen. It doesn’t throw a few dollars at Thorn’s feet or applaud, but manages to seem like it appreciates the solo show well enough anyway, even if it does yawn a few times during the performance.

For his part, Thorn enjoys his audience so much that he and his wife wrote a song and shot a video in tribute to his favorite crowd member.

Sadly, none of the clips feature Thorn working his way through the Fleet Foxes discography all on his own or offering the animal a chance to hear its very favorite Jimi Hendrix single, which is, of course … “Purple Haze.”

[via Boing Boing]

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