Animal Collective - Strawberry Jam

wat is it

There's already a threddd.

well, sorry an old thread where the new album has been discussed.

new animal collective

i love the cover art

It's awful.

Gman, are you related to eman?

ahh sorry didn't see that....i thought the whole thing was about sung tongs

the cover? i like it..... its kind of funny....i think it fits the band

naw sorry im not

gm0n

"A sacred night where we'll watch the fireworks/ The frightened babies poo/ They've got two flashing eyes and they're colored why/ They make me feel that I'm only all I see sometimes"

these lyrics are fucking horrible

How do you know these are the lyrics? Where are they printed?

But, dued, they remind us of our childhood and reflect the innocence of the children.

Another option:

And I can't lift you up, my mind is tired
It's family beaches I desire
To say good night, we'll watch the fireworks
That frighten babies, boo
They've got two flashing eyes, they're colorblind
They make me feel that I'm only all I see sometimes

criticising a band for something that has no significance other than as a cliché in what's written about them isn't really playing fair.

xpost

I'm so sorry.

Also poo>>>boo.

"The sixth album by this neocommunalist, neopsychedelic quartet improves on 2005's Feels, flashing more shards of tune to lure the coeds with the Coleman PerfectFlow InstaStart Lanterns over to their adamantly unkempt campfire. The welcoming “Peacebone,” the energetic “Chores” and the elated “Cuckoo Cuckoo” might get a young leisure consumer to risk conversion at one of the grotty neoprimitivist orgies their shows are bruited to be. Then again, the ninety seconds of weirded-up solo organ ostinato that then underlies or swallows three minutes of incomprehensible singing on “Winter Wonder Land” might inspire the same normal to stay home and watch Seinfeld reruns. It depends on how he or she felt about the six-minute centerpiece, “For Reverend Green,” where the listener strains to hear frontman Avey Tare rave, “I think it's all right to feel human now.” Great, really. But didn't we know that already?"

ROBERT CHRISTGAU

"For Reverend Green" is so good. As has been noted many times.

it's better than Feels.

it's better than anything by them so far

Well, Mark's review has inspired me to give this another listen. I have to say though, after the first 3 listens I was pretty certain it's my least favorite Animal Collective release, ever. It emphasizes aspects of their sound that I don't like very much.

I've gone back to it after a short break and some of the sections have sunk in. Chores and Unsolved Mysteries sound like classics to me now whereas I wasn't too sure about them before.

i just picked this up today. im liking it a lot. The big standouts for me right now after 1 listen is "For Reverend Green" and "Chores".

Both terrific songs.

cover looks 100X more awesome irl. packaging is great too.

"derek" is a standout as well.

maybe i just didn't pay as much attention to it as i do now but...did Noah always sing like Brian Wilson on Animal Collective albums? or did this just happen since Person Pitch?

maybe I just never listened for it before.

regardless. this is a great release. definately their most 'accessable' to date

yah and i still stand beside the cover art and packaging....its has a great look and feel...espessially for the nostalgic themes of the album

yah "derek" is probably my favorite album closer of 2007 so far

"Winter Wonder Land" is brilliant too

http://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/animal_collective/strawberry_jam/

What are we looking at?

So, it's a couple of decent songs, a bit of filler. Never really understood the hype for these guys; when I want weird I usually go weirder, when I want pop I usually go poppier.

^This is about right. Especially re Strawberry Jam.

when I want indie rock...I will listen to this.

Do you guys get "Here Comes The Indian" mixed with the best qualities of "Feels" off of this album?

I'm really enjoying it - from the perspective that it's a step forward from Feels, which left me a bit flat, and it's also synthesizing ideas from their more experimental material.

Sorry what? That would be a good album.

the album feels too lean to me. Too dense. I wish they would've stretched out bits, like the ending of Chores. Nice trance quality to the end of #1. Lot of nice sounds on this

Cuckoo's piano loop is pleasant. Nice, thick, crunching guitars and rolling drums on this. The various swooping and swirling sounds out of nowhere sort of remind me of the disparate excesses of sound you'd hear on an Olivia Tremor Control or related record. But this works better. Also remindin' me of later period xiu xiu's clatterin' blasts of sound, but more structurally sound and flush.

I really like this album a lot.

WAIT SCRATCH THAT I FREAKING ADORE THIS ALBUM A LOT.

O! I guess the poo lyrics are official.
I like these lyrics from rev green

A running child's bloody with burning knees
A careless child's money flew in the trees
A camping child's happy with winter's freeze
A lucky child don't know how lucky she is

"when I want indie rock...I will listen to this."

Ok. Maybe I can blame being just shy of 30, but when I was in high school I listened to indie rock all the time. Now I rarely think "I'd love something indie!" I want other qualities out of it, because I've just heard so goddamned much indie rock that I have no real need for any new indie rock.

About everything I wanted from Animal Collective, I got from Rac-oo-oon (or however many ooo they have)—the swirling percussion, the weird phasing and delay, the psych-tribal other-worldliness. It's not that I don't like AC, it's just that, especially by this album, I have a hard time ever thinking of when I NEED to listen to them. They mostly just sound like aftershocks of Elephant 6 to me, which is OK (I'd put SJ at a B/B-), just not the jizz-worthy explosion.

Oh, and stuff I don't NEED to hear = stuff I don't buy.

I am going to see them in about half an hour. Scott Colburn's new band Wizard Prison is opening. yay!

I've been playing "Feels" and "Strawberry Jam" all week/weekend. Such spastically happy fun psychedelicpopcrazy. I dont usually get into stuff like this, but these guys are just great.

Trayce, you're a regular Animal Collective cheerleader.

Heh sorry. I get like this when I find new things I like a lot.

their best by a huge margin.

HUEGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

still AMAZING

He really knows how to make a shitty sentence sound poignant.

I saw 'em on Friday. I'd never seen or heard any footage of them live so I had no idea what to expect. I think I liked it, but it was different than I had guessed - way more drawn-out, beat-oriented than I would have expected for some reason.

agreed...best by them yet

artwork has to be seen in person to really be appreciated. vibrant colors, glossy paper. at times i almost felt sick looking at it, like i was looking at someone's insides

The booklet cover art is much better than the proper album cover, and more in line with their previous album covers as well. For some reason the plate really bothers me.

WHERE WAS PANDA BEAR MOTHERFUCKERS?!?!

I don't think I would have gone if I had known I would be seeing the Avey Tare show (with Geologist and Deakin who actually kinda stole the show with his Panda-esque backing vox). Avey did that annoying yelping thing for like 16 straight bars once. Not a bad show, but they need Lennox to round off all those rough spikes of sound (at least for me).

uh, it's deakin that is not on this tour. panda-esque indeed.

also, they are doing more panda bear songs than ever so I don't see how it was the avey tare show.

weird. i'm not that familiar with their looks, having only seen them once before, but I thought otherwise, although I spent most of the show trying to figure it out. maybe i've always had them mixed up, thought Noah was blonder. at any rate, they only did two songs with that dude on lead (the first one of which made me think it was him even tho I was confused about the hair color) and Avey had the mic in his hand for pretty much the whole set, definitely playing front person. and yelping loudly.

they also did a super long version of "Fireworks", a drastically reconfigured "Who Could Win A Rabbit", and a super noisy screaming "We Tigers". plus one from Feels and "Peace Bone".

panda:
http://www.brooklynvegan.com/img/music/pandacollective.jpg
deaks:
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/20/72096362_27806489d1.jpg?v=0

I'm going to the show tonight. Kinda disappointed it's not a foursome, especially since the San Francisco Weekly interviewed Deakin in their preview of the show. Weak, dude.

people should be advised that it's not like they are just playing the same stuff without deakin. they prepared a whole new set including about 11 new songs. like when avey and panda toured as a duo doing the sung tongs right after hcti. except then noone really knew about them i guess.

in the larger scheme of things, membership has been really quite fluid. best AC show i ever saw was just AT and Panda.

animal collective will be on conan o brien october 5th

!

yeah, it's all gonna be over after the big rusted root/dave matthews bandAC/Vampire Weekend show next month

whats everyones reasons for hating this album so much. In the AC album poll this was one of the least voted for. There are so many brilliant moments on this album. Is it because maybe its their most accessible stuff yet? I think this is them at their poppiest and ILM usually seems to love that kind of thing.

Just wondering what some of the complaints with this album are.

^^^^

i think one of these songs samples the sound The Grape Lady made when she stomped on the grapes.

generally speaking beople who liked the previous albums don'y like this one and vice versa.most ILMers liked the previous.plus,it's not as inventive as the one's before (though i like it!)

Just wondering what some of the complaints with this album are.

I'm in the "vocals way too clear and loud" camp

just sounds off to me

I did have the two of them confused! thanks mizzell.

ha, I came away from that show thinking "wow their voices all sound really similar".

Yeah, I don't kno, I love the vocals in Reverend Green though.

xxp

But Peacebone just annoys me.

BONEFACE

"Peacebone" is brilliant.

do people hate those screams? they're probably my favorite of the song, which is one of my fave. on the album.

on the song*

They work really well in that song I reckon, better than the screaming on Feels.

The screams are great! I have come to these guys knowing nothing about them and I heard Feels and SJ first. I really like it a lot - and now I'm happy to go back and get into Sung Tongs and the more laid back things theyve done (that thing with Vashti Bunyan is very pretty).

If you like this, Sung Tongs will blow your mind.

no rly

ya rly. It's way better.

I'm not trying to be political about about it, I'm just saying.

I mean, I like the new one, too! But I kinda like this band a lot and stuff.

i have a hard time reading the lyrics while sitting on the toilet. font is all soft and scraggly

WHERE WAS PANDA BEAR MOTHERFUCKERS?!?!

uh, it's deakin that is not on this tour. panda-esque indeed.

Hilarious. This must happen alot. At the show tonight someone up front kept asking Avey where Panda was. He pointed, but the kid didn't believe him. Avey pointed again, then had to say "he's right there. HE'S RIGHT THERE!" Deakin must have more of a rockstar face or something.

Gah, I want to like this because Animal Collective are seriously the best band on the planet right now. But this is complete shite. Even compared to stuff I'm not so keen on like Manatee Danse. But even that had its moments. This could be an Arcade Fire album or Tv On The Radio. Does nobody else remember when they were mental?! I mean, why are they re-releasing Holinndagain at all? That is a great album. Feels was amazing, those primal scream jolts, shit it was like some Brian Wilson nightmare. Not some vacuum packed "weirdness". Fuck tunes.

"I'm in the "vocals way too clear and loud" camp

just sounds off to me"

Yep.

I'm in the "I can't stop listening to 'Fireworks' long enough to form an opinion about the rest of the album" camp

as camps go, it's not an unpleasant one

I'm stuck on "Winter Wonder Land" myself. This album makes me happy in my squigglyspooch or something.

o_O

Yeah, that totally didn't come out as cute as I thought it would.

I haven't been too impressed by what I've heard from this album.

Trayce will be disappointed.

i'm mad this wasn't the cover for the single
http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/8667/peacebonepq2qm0hd8.jpg

whats that the cover of?

WTF I am getting sick of random snide fucking digs at me all over the fucking board lately.

I have listened to this about once and think it's overall great, actually a bit surprised it's that good. Sure it sounds a bit Arcade Fire but AC prove that doesn't have to be a bad thing...

And I almost prefer Avey Tares yelping over Panda Bears politically correct crooning or whatevr.

whats that the cover of?
some dude made it cause some hater on some messageboard desribed peacebone as sounding like a game boy vomiting.

It does sound like a video game vomiting! And it's good!

in other news: Bros before Whoas

can't dig this album cuz of the vocals, not the upfront mix so much as avey's melodies being kind of annoying this time around and 'person pitch' is still better than anything they've done since 'sung tongs' (fuk u if u disagree)

anyway has this peacebone video been posted yet?

ahahahahaha that black rob/panda bear mix

that is way better than it deserves to be

the screaming bit in the video was embarrassing.

yea i don't like that video much

"person pitch" makes animal collective seem sort of pointless

;)

strawberry jam > Person pitch

Life in general > Person Pitch's utterly unwarranted reputation.

only in sunny costa mesa, ned

And funnily enough it's cloudy outside right now and the comparison STILL holds!

"utterly"?!?! I thought you liked it OK!

Judge for yourself, but I stand by my 'aiming to make a lot of interesting ideas seem kinda flat' comment. Right now it's my 'overrated' winner of the year like TV on the Radio was last year.

actually i like person pitch most when just walking around outside enjoying the weather and outdoors.
it makes me feel good. its a good compliment to life.

Ned, how did you feel about Strawberry Jam?

Not heard it yet, doubtless I will (in fact I think a friend sent me some links or mp3s or something last night). I think it's the only AC related thing I haven't heard this year, a situation which itself is really odd -- it's best kept in mind that I really have never felt much about the band and was kinda surprised to be added to the Paw Tracks promo list a while back, but anyway.

My whole sense of AC is that they mean well enough but in a way that doesn't connect with me at all outside of a moment or two. An assemblage that never quite takes on a life or interest to me on its own. *shrug* Oh well. There's plenty else out there to actively love (and actively hate).

Life in general > Person Pitch's utterly unwarranted reputation.

-- Ned Raggett, Saturday, 22 September 2007 00:38 (42 minutes ago)

^keeping in mind this is #1 oasis fan talking

Roxor. Nah, got off that boat a while back. Actually haven't listened to much I loved in the nineties in a long, long time. Mostly these days it's very new albums, random weird mp3s courtesy of Mutant Sounds of Czech prog records from 1974 or whatever and bits of pop, plus god knows how many CDRs and things.

http://www.oasisinet.com/Images/galleries/Bandpic_687.jpg

;-)

what unwarranted reputation are you referring to? not really aware of one myself other than the beach boys thing, but that always get lazily tagged onto anything by animal collective

I don't question anyone's love for the album at all, yet it's one of those cases where a conflation between what the album is and what it stands for can easily occur. The AMG review there, as with nearly everything I write, is something I look at with an unsatisfied eye, because I didn't capture my ambivalence to my satisfaction readily enough. I appreciate what it *stands* for -- a musical range that busts out of a lot of unnecessary categorizations, one that reflects a lot of wide-ranging listening that's commendable and, frankly, necessary. But I just don't think what it *is* is as remarkable as it is made out to be in other corners. And since the album rather self-consciously is aiming for the rapturously all-encompassing, that makes its failure to me more regrettable. So my snark up above was obviously reflexive in character but I think there's room for saying, "You know, nice try, but perhaps something else will connect on this level more, so I'm not going to kowtow." Hell, you could say that in turn about a lot of things I love past and present and I'd be fine with it.

that makes sense - it seems from the review that you like a lot of the music ("Bros" at least), but are ambivalent about the way the album is recieved and the way people treat it.

Yeah, there are definitely moments where it works! FWIW the review was written well before the conventional wisdom settled in on it; I heard it pretty much on its own outside of a few ILX posts. So rather than offering a corrective or alternate opinion I was just thinking as per usual about what I was listening to and concluding, "Hm, well, here and there, yeah, but anyway."

actually i like person pitch most when just walking around outside enjoying the weather and outdoors.

this is how i feel towards all Animal Collective related work. though live, they can't be beat

this is how i feel towards all Animal Collective related work. though live, they can't be beat

this album is pretty cool through headphones too. person pitch i feel is just a lot more consistantly "feel good"

not to take anything away from strawberry jam

i guess i get the gameboy thing....it kinda sounds like tetris

going to see them live on thursday. can't decide whether to get extremely stoned or just mildly stoned. suggestions?

bring earplugs

I didn't need earplugs when I saw em. Avey Tare allegedly lost his voice and carried on like a 12 year old and bailed after a couple of songs. Waste of money that was.

was that at Rock Herk? you should have stuck around, they did an acoustic set in the parking lot.

No, this was in Australia.

Apparently their gig in Melbourne was blisteringly fast paced and insanely happygood.

This was the Brisbane gig, I think it was their first in Aus. They sounded great.

And Lost Domain supported, they were also really good.

KEXP session linked from pitchfork
mark rich@rdson getting ripped by the kids on the ac messageboard for not knowing that it's essplode they play during fireworks.

^^^that almost makes me sad that i missed their show on monday.

Christgau's got the lyric wrong: "inhuman" not "human." What'd we expect from him?

friend told me he had extra ticket for monday night at webster. if i can get out of work early i go see them

Christgau's got the lyric wrong: "inhuman" not "human." What'd we expect from him?

glad somebody else heard "inhuman" because that's what i quoted in my review.

It's in the liner too.

Saw the show Wed. night in Atlanta. The three-piece set-up was fine. Avey rarely played guitar. The crowd was disappointed there was no "Rev. Green," but whatever. The way they reworked many tracks, esp. those from 'Sung Tongs,' and the new stuff (or at least stuff I'd never heard before), Avey's voice, and the improvising was all top-notch. The vertical lights were great. More like something you'd see in an art gallery. I wished I had earplugs only because some of the electronics gets very high-pitched - they sounded surprisingly good for the Variety Playhouse.

Highly recommended. Like all of their records.

it's interesting that they played some old songs because they never used to do that.

that is a good thing

full set will be on NPR tonight
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14564305

all those archive, too.

yeah, but hopefully npr will have a better recording set-up than a fan.

haha i mean npr archives the shows they record.

maybe i misunderstood what you were saying.

i thought you were talking about the sets on Archive.org

anyone going to nyc show mon?

No.

;-)

i'm def going on sunday, maybe on monday

i'm going to the sunday show..

I can't wait to see them in Dublin. I have to believe that live is where this album is going to make sense. Panda Bear support would be bitchin', do they do that?

they don't do that, and PB is reportedly tired of his own "lame shit" at this point.

anyone going to nyc show mon?

webster hall blows

xpost
Where was that reported?!

hmmm, the messed up fireworks halfway (while doing the lovely 'essplode' interpolation) and then refused an encore after playing for just one hour. the rest was good, but c'mon.

webster hall blows
otm

true!
still not sure if i'm going to go tonight or not.

hopefully they will have worked out the sound issues, but it is hard to imagine having a really fun time at this place. though i did when i saw the streets, fwiw.

i do have a couple of spliffs rolled up just in case tho! fuck it. i'm gonna go

that's the spirit! i am now determined to have fun!

The boss is gone for the rest of the day! no excuse not to leave here at a reasonable hour and go to the show

o, they were just on Sound Check but I missed it.

letter from an angry mom sent to sean agnew, the founder of r5 productions in philadelphia, regarding saturday's animal collective show:

"You should be brought up on charges for what went down Saturday night, is this an underground cult you are running with Animal Collective?

My daughter and her friends were terrified, no security, no police, not even a show, music playing backwards and men trying to lure them away, only one door to exit out and no cab would come pick them up
because the location they gave did not exist, no one ever heard of the Polaris club or the address.

What kind of scheme are you running.....

I will find someone to listen and have your organization investigated, you endangered several young adults on Saturday night.

I hope your child never goes thru what hell you put ours thru,
I hope you rot in hell, or is that were your from!"

holy shit

I hope you rot in hell, or is that were your from!

instant classic.

Okay, now I'm really excited about going to see them in Dublin!

watch out for the music, though. they play it BACKWARDS.

haha

So... Avey support then?

WAHT

lol @ that letter

so pfork picked up the story about the letter and printed the dudes response, it's roffle-worthy
Agnew's response to the mother informed her that there were 12 R5 staff members, one police officer, and two "uniformed and armed licensed state security officers" stationed at the venue (indie kids can sure get rowdy!), which happens to have three exits, and had plenty of cabs out front.

He ended his e-mail with "We are not a cult and you have horrible grammar. Good luck on your journey with your child."

haha!

did you go last night mizzell?

yes! it was way improved. i stayed in the balcony and really dug the new songs. what about you?

yeah, it was good. as far as webster hall goes i thought the sound was decent. oh and i almost knocked Björk down coming out of the restroom

whoa, that's fun was she wearing this?
http://bigsecretpizzaparty.typepad.com/shhhh/images/2007/04/25/bjork.jpg
prolly hard to avoid running into her.

Avey on the AC message board about the first night at Webster Hall:

"i think i owe eveyone who was at the first nyc show an apology. .....According to a friend sasha frere jones thinks we are dicks for not playing on and will not write a planned feature he had for us in the new yorker..."

awww, s/fj didn't get to see the show he wanted. poor s/fj. poor poor s/fj.

what happened? the set was cut short?

well they played for over an hour. they stopped in the middle of fireworks.

stopped the song not the set. they played a couple more, then stopped, no encore, despite the house lights and music not coming up and people cheering for a bit.

oic. I read that bit upthread but I didn't realize that was about the first new york show.

so is this the first time they've toured their current record instead of working out new stuff?

They did stuff from Grass at oxygen last summer.

Sorry that was meant to say, they did stuff from Feels at Oxegen last summer

yeah, it has been a slow steady change. They played Kids on Holiday and We Tigers (and Winter's Love, omnce) during the Feels tours and then a handful of Feels songs during Jam tours. but they have played all but 3 songs from SJ on this tour. But they are still playing about 12 new songs now, so they are def working out new stuff.

apparently the 2nd show was great. i couldn't make monday but i'm kinda bummed that this one especially 'bad' show was the first time i was seeing one of my favourite groups. the rest of the show really was pretty good, but the atmosphere after the fireworks debacle just sorta dipped and never really recovered.

Animal Collective doing '#1' on Conan

Whoa.

weird choose of song

i'm all about playing weird shit on national tv or whatever, but i wish they'd just ran through 'peacebone' and gotten the fuck out.

it's really hard to be ominous (or whatever they were going for) on conan w/o being like, sun0)) and wearing hooded robes and shit.

Ominous? Hahahah! What?

Definitely not a conventional choice of song for a late night talk show, but then again, if I were hearing Animal Collective for the first time with that appearance, I think my interest would be piqued a bit, more so than if they had played "Peacebone" or the like.

lol
http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b379/ajdphotobucket/acconanwb7.jpg

I love how late night hosts are holding up vinyl instead of CDs lately.

WHAT KIND OF BACKWARDS SPEAKING CULT ARE YOU RUNNING HERE??????????

lol @ that pic obv.

due to the size of a vinyl vs. a cd it makes sense for bands to give 'em vinyl.

Its like cool or whatever.

♪ ♪

How do you do that?

that clip was amaze

definitely topped the previous most o_0 talkshow performance I'd seen (Pavement doing Stop Breathing on Leno)

bbc session up at http://gorillavsbear.blogspot.com/
sweet new version of doggy/heylight

Finally starting to not resent this album.

why do you resent it?

my favorite of theirs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjcMFtgsq5M