Animal Collective Cd Review: Making noise rock dreamy

By Jenny Gumbert

January 21, 2009

Source: Freelance Contributor

Saying that Animal Collective is a band of numerous sounds would be an understatement. The group has experimented with more genres than one can think of and has created sounds that have periodically seemed completely unnecessary. They have produced numerous songs that are wonderfully trippy and others that are raucous and hardly listenable. But ultimately the group is responsible for some of the most creative and profound songs of the past ten years.

Their latest achievement, “Merriweather Post Pavilion,” recalls the psychedelic romanticism of their classic album “Feels" and collaborates sounds of the exploding choruses from 2007’s “Strawberry Jam” to create their most striking and cohesive album to date.

Among their sporadic yelps and layered chaotic synth melodies, band members Avey Tare, Panda Bear and the Geologist have refined their sound as much as possible without compromising their integrity. “Merriweather Post Pavilion" is a pop record too bizarre for radio play.

The album is like the soundtrack to the Beach Boys' harshest and most joyous acid trip of their lives. The plethora of sound samples in each song is so deeply and cleverly layered that it creates an intensely stunning experience for the listener, a musical experience that is almost too overwhelming to grasp. Listener’s ears are thrown from one noise to the next, each one curious and quasi-musical. But overall, the sounds of Animal Collective coalesce to create a dreamy landscape.

The most intriguing portion of the album is in sweet melodies sung by Panda Bear, aka Noah Lennox, and Avey Tare, aka David Porter. Unlike the Porter led “Strawberry Jam,” Lennox fronts most of the songs in vocals while Porter harmonizes in the background.

Lennox’s mellow voice gives this manic album a much-needed center, lending the listener something soothing to follow through the jungle of sounds.

The album opener, “In The Flowers,” starts with a surging, sonic noise that is accompanied by a lightly twinkling echo of sound. The smoothness of Panda Bear’s voice quickly joins in, glittering along with the music. The song quickly builds to a climax and the chorus hits; the listener wades in the shallow sounds until the big wave of noise comes crashing down. The result is so overwhelmingly beautiful in its grandeur that is almost indescribable.

It would be easy to talk about each song in this album with descriptive and joyous terms; from the panicked urgency in the vocals as they repeat “are you also frightened?” in “Also Frightened”, to the bounding chorus of “My Girls” and the romantic imagery in “Bluish”, the album is an overall epic listening experience.

Listen to the album, uncover each layer and unearth each new sound. There is much to appreciate in Animal Collective’s well-thought-out album.