Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavilion (2009)

Mizzell, thanks a lot for the set list. Just checked and the Field-ish Panda Bear song was 'Daily Routine'. That guitar-ish sample (from about 3.30 into that song on MPP) was turned right up and each hit set up this gorgeous bunch of ripples after it. Really great.

(thanks too Number None - that's a pretty song!)

yeah, I don't get all the hate for "Daily Routine." I like the shifting dynamics of the album, & the schizoid nature of it definitely warrants the early-M. Rev comparisons A/C always get: From madcap bubblegum one minute to zoned-out drones the next. Fine by me.

"Daily Routine" doesn't seem particularly more difficult than "Also Frightened", "Guys Eyes" and "Taste", all of which strike me as equally as approachable as or more approachable then the majority of their recorded music prior to this album.

Also I like its loping waltz rhythm.

i acknowledge that we human beings have difference of opinions and whatever, but i cannot imagine someone sitting down with this album playing and not liking it. it's unthinkable and kind of depresses me. even if you tried really hard not to like it, you would just find yourself thinking about the album so much you would inevitably want to listen to it again, right? i know it's 2009 and nobody likes anything anymore, and i know animal collective aren't the beatles, but i just wish everyone would just love this album alot and it became a real, widely listened-to classic album that everyone and their grandmothers could get down to. i want to go out this summer and hear "summertime clothes" being played from people's car radios, i want to hear "my girls" and "brother sport" played at dance parties. are we really too cynical to let this masterpiece of an album go to waste? pitchfork and every blog on the internet are doing their part by hyping it to shreds, but i really wish it somehow gets further. and why do people decry hype, anyways? i guess they feel it's undeserved or whatever, and okay maybe we tend to exaggerate when we like something, but can't we just have one album that we can all just love together? i listen to some freaky music, but this is a fucking pop album. i wouldn't expect a metalhead to love it, but is it really necessary for us normal people to dislike it?

god i hate when ppl pull this "i am proud that i dont understand _____" shit

xpost. sock?

i acknowledge that we human beings have difference of opinions and whatever, but i cannot imagine someone sitting down with this album playing and not liking it. it's unthinkable and kind of depresses me.

Yeah, I remember how I reacted to first hearing Loveless too.

(Seriously, not trying to be mean here, but time will tell.)

i suppose you're right. i don't mean to say everyone has to really really love it though, just that they should all at least be like "it's not my thing, but it's a good album" or something along those lines. i realize that it's incredibly naive of me to say that, and i typed most of that post during the really epic ending of "brother sport," but there's a legitimate point to be made in that there aren't many huge albums anymore, and besides the odd solid, ubiquitous top 40 radio jam, music isn't as uniting as (i imagine) it used to be. why is that?

you are right. mpp is brilliant. but Feels is even better imo.

I like the album but the above is incredibly silly samosa. Think outside the zone of your own taste and obviously plenty of people will dislike/be bored by/hate/have no opinion whatsoever about this record.

but can't we just have one album that we can all just love together?

― samosa gibreel, Saturday, January 17, 2009 1:31 AM (11 hours ago) Bookmark

^ That's a pretty impossible thing, you know.

I love this record and I'm super happy that everybody else loves it too.

Compared to other latter-day Animal Collective records, I don't love the mix. It's bright and compressed and lacking in subtlety and it makes my ears ring. This record reminds me of Jagged Little Pill, or Is This It... it'll sounds great on the radio but not on the headphones.

so you're saying that this is basically our generation's "jagged little pill"?

i don't know about this/last year as a whole, but between MPP, fever ray and gang gang dance, this season is totally touching me in all the right ways and places.

I don't hate the album, and let's be honest - when it comes to me and the Animal Collective/Panda Bear/Joanna Newsom collective, not hating it might be the best you can hope for.

ugh man, leave Joanna Newsom out of this man. She's awful.

so you're saying that this is basically our generation's "jagged little pill"?

― s1ocki, Saturday, January 17, 2009 4:24 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark

Exactly not,

(Although I can imagine Avey singing a line like "You're my best friend / best friend with benefits / I am aware now / I am aware now")

do Animal Collective understand Irony better than Alanis?

i love me some of 'is this it' on headphones, actually

ugh man, leave Joanna Newsom out of this man. She's awful.

Let's not make false distinctions.

are we really too cynical to let this masterpiece of an album go to waste?

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/153/421990057_159d0760d9.jpg

i acknowledge that we human beings have difference of opinions and whatever, but i cannot imagine someone sitting down with this album playing and not liking it. it's unthinkable and kind of depresses me.

i honestly think it's kinda depressing that so many people like it. as owen pointed out, the mix is crap, and as other people have said, there are better AC albums out there.

i know everybody needs an album to 'get behind' lately so they can feel better about the state of music, etc, but i have listened to this record several times and tried to like it and i just DON'T. the production is super blown out, hypercolor vomit; the melodies are too frenetic and clipped together to really stick in my head, and i just think a lot of the loops sound clunky and overwrought.

listening to MPP is like being in the room with somebody who has done way too much coke, basically. it's a visceral experience, but one i'd rather avoid if given the chance.

I think Owen's JLP comparison is spot on, and that's part of what nauseated me about the record. All high end, no bottom.

^good point, but i dont think that's always a bad thing necessarily. the walkmen for example

'Daily Routine' is great, it catches the same kind of vibe as the outro on 'Chores', Lennox is really great at that kind of slowing down thing. I've gone from not being bothered about 2/3rds of MPP to loving all but about one track in the space of a week, I do think seeing them live on Thursday cemented all that though.

'Lion In A Coma' sucks such massive balls, although 'Summertime Clothes' hugely redeems Portner for that.

I'm seeing people who loathed AC for some time loving a fair swathe of this record now.

i know everybody needs an album to 'get behind' lately so they can feel better about the state of music, etc, but i have listened to this record several times and tried to like it and i just DON'T. the production is super blown out, hypercolor vomit; the melodies are too frenetic and clipped together to really stick in my head, and i just think a lot of the loops sound clunky and overwrought.

I always think that about every Animal Collective record, for about a month, then it ceases being an issue.

being in a room with someone who has done way too much coke is not a visceral experience.

Unless you're doing it with them??

it can be viscerally repugnant

Conspicuously pregnant

"being in a room with someone who has done way too much coke "

depends who's the guy/girl

I've gone from not being bothered about 2/3rds of MPP to loving all but about one track in the space of a week, I do think seeing them live on Thursday cemented all that though.

^^^ this totally. The whole live thing has definitely changed the way I'm hearing this, though it's hard to put my finger on how exactly. But now I'm definitely hearing pulses and rhythyms that I didn't really notice before, I'm thinking about who's doing what and how the parts are related to each other, I'm navigating my way into what had previously seemed a flat, bright, bewildering wall of sound and it's really coming ALIVE, and damn, I'm still seeing fucking strobe lights going off in my head when I think about listening to it.

http://www.rock107.com/albums/The-Top-107-Albums-Of-All-Time/Peter_Frampton_Frampton_Comes_Alive.jpg

Show me the way, Pete.

(but watch out for the trick behind you, dude)

duh, trick truck

a little btw...

yay

"hip" a capella groups are the worst thing in all the world imo

yes

This thread should be re-titled: Click here for massively unpopular opinions.

I love this record and I'm super happy that everybody else loves it too.

Compared to other latter-day Animal Collective records, I don't love the mix. It's bright and compressed and lacking in subtlety and it makes my ears ring. This record reminds me of Jagged Little Pill, or Is This It... it'll sounds great on the radio but not on the headphones.

I really didn't fall for this record until I listened to it without headphones for the first time. The compression thing is weird... I don't have the vinyl yet, am intrigued to see if there's less compression in the vinyl mastering - I've been listening to it off mp3 ripped from vinyl.

inhibitionist, did your review by chance mention how their singing is often times annoying (maybe in more clever words)?

No, because on Merriweather, the two vocalists' voices are at their least annoying, imo. However, if you can't tolerate Beach Boys-like vocals, you may find this album tough going.
― inhibitionist, Tuesday, 13 January 2009 07:56 (6 days ago)

please don't compare beach boys vocals to animal collective vocals

lol

please don't compare beach boys vocals to animal collective vocals

i half-agree. i think the comparison is justified with panda bear, but i agree it couldn't be further from the truth in avey tare's case. besnard lakes, now that's a band with beach boys vocals.

please don't compare beach boys vocals to animal collective vocals

i half-agree. i think the comparison is justified with panda bear, but i agree it couldn't be further from the truth in avey tare's case. besnard lakes, now that's a band with beach boys vocals.

This.

I do, however, adore the new AC record. I think I like it a little bit more than Strawberry Jam, but a little less than Feels. That could change after a few listens though.

there actually *is* a great deal going on more that I wasn't hearing on the mp3 leak really.

So, I'm actually really digging this album. I like about 4 of the songs on it (My Girls, Summertime Clothes, Taste, and Bluish). The more I listen to it, the more I like it (unlike, say, Person Pitch where the more I listened the less I liked it).

After the obv ("Brother Sport") my current favourite is "Guys Eyes" - it's like all these waves crashing over each other, but much more tuneful than that implies.

Album has really grown on me after getting used to the production. The good songs are utterly fantastic, and the weaker songs not as blah as I originally thought. Guys Eyes, though, reminds me somewhat of Ben Folds Five, which is somewhat off-putting.