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Merriweather Post Pavilion | 
| Artist: Animal Collective
Label: Domino
Category: Music
List Price: £13.99
Buy New: £8.98
You Save: £5.01 (36%)
Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 35
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
EAN: 5034202021629
ASIN: B001JRY1L2
Release Date: January 12, 2009 (In 5 Days)
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Not yet released
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| Tracks:
| • | In The Flowers | | • | My Girls | | • | Also Frightened | | • | Summertime Clothes | | • | Daily Routine | | • | Bluish | | • | Guys Eyes | | • | Taste | | • | Lion In A Coma | | • | No More Runnin | | • | Brother Sport |
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| Customer Reviews:
Beautiful psychedelic pop: their finest album yet January 7, 2009
Before anyone had heard a note of the music, Animal Collective had already set the tone for their eighth album perfectly when they unveiled its artwork. A mosaic of tiny leaves which doubles as an eerie optical illusion, it's a nice reflection of the hypnotic but warm record it represents. Unlike its predecessor, 2007's patchy if frequently astounding Strawberry Jam, 'Merriweather Post Pavillion' is a continuous, otherworldy trip, something evident from opening track 'In The Flowers'' mission statement, "If I could just leave my body for the night", a lyric which is followed by a gloriously entrancing blast of noise.
Consisting of four school friends (though one, Deakin, is sitting this one out), Animal Collective's sound is constantly evolving, but characterised by its restless experimentalism. Excluding their early albums (basically free-for-all sessions which occasionally resemble an actual collective of animals), they bury their melodies under unsettling waves of noise, incoherent hollering and primitive drums. Featuring songs they've been playing around with in their live shows for two years, 'Merriweather Post Pavillion' sounds like a career high throughout: it's simultaneously their most ambitious album to date and their most accessible.
All the tracks are bathed in layers of swirling synths and some, such as closer 'Brothersport', build on a new-found obsession with dance music which they've been hinting at in recent interviews. But almost all of them centre around Avey Tare and Panda Bear's sweet harmonies, which will pleasantly surprise anyone who's been annoyed in the past by Avey's sometimes grating lead vocals. They haven't completely abandoned their old ways - the stop-start blasts of yelping and squelchy keyboard on 'Daily Routine' would have fit in just fine on 'Strawberry Jam' - but on 'Summertime Clothes' and 'Bluish', they sound like a pop band for the first time, whilst losing none of their psychedelic allure.
The album also shows growing maturity in its lyrics, previously one of the band's main weaknesses. Album highlight 'My Girls', for example, trades impenetrable squawking for genuine emotion. It's Panda's message to his wife and children, which finishes by repeating a defiant cry of "I don't need to seem like I care about material things like a social status." Only on the dire 'Lion In A Coma' - a failed attempt to initiate the digeridoo into indie-rock - do they abandon tunefulness for experimentalism altogether. Otherwise, this is Animal Collective's most coherent and fully-realised album, both original and universally likeable. So the hype is justified: it's every bit as immersive as those trippy leaves.
All That Was Promised January 6, 2009
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Ever see that evolution of dance video? Of course you did. It gave us a comical but all the more fascinating insight into just how much one thing can change. So how about pop music? Whoever's been at its helm over the last 50/60 years since it emerged as the dollar's genre of choice has done something different, adjusting it into something fresh and exciting, always at a stage when the chances of said occurring look pretty slim. I won't declare pop to be in a fragile state currently but with this "80's revival" having just gone a little bit too far, "it's time for change". And it's really quite brilliant that the ones that look to have done a master-stroke in perhaps changing the genre once more are one of the most alternative, experimental acts around today.
Let's not get out of our depth by calling 'Merriweather Post Pavilion' a pop record. It might be Animal Collective's most commercially-inclined work to date but it doesn't consistently follow pop conventions or most essentially, ask for your money. Instead it inhales the finer things of the genre, as well as many others, and the album's output is a well-bred combination of its input in the form of a dense multiplier of new ideas through hefty use of sampling and dreamy electronically enhanced vocal melodies. And you can imagine "forward-thinking" pop artists taking note right now.
Animal Collective's appeal has always been that they've thought outside the box. And for their standards, 'Merriweather...' is their least groundbreaking work to date, from an outsider's view. Nothing makes you uncomfortable or nervy like 'Strawberry Jam' or 'Sung Tongs' could and nothing sounds so drastically different that the preferable option is to just stop listening instead of immersing yourself in what could turn out to be something brilliant. Instead, this time the three-piece (excluding "Deakin" on this occasion) have merged previous ideas whilst coming up with something entirely new. And it's really hard to tell quite how they did it.
We've seen hints of what's become on 'Merriweather...' before; through their emergetic live shows and in particular, Panda Bear's very own 'Person Pitch', an album that completely out-did Avey Tare's solo work in terms of critical acclaim, songwriting quality, everything. In 'Summertime Clothes' you get given a chance to recite the 30 heat and the relaxation that I at least, associated so fondly with Noah Lennox's creation. Jerky electronics emerge shortly after a dictaphone-sample of waves, children; you can always picture smiles. And 'Daily Routine', a slightly darker affair, was originally set aside as a Panda Bear song for future works. You just get the idea that the band all had a sit down and raised the issue; "Hey Noah, you don't suppose you could give us any ideas, do you?"
Preferably you should be listening to the record accompanied by basking sunlight and dense beaches but that's obviously hard to come by unless you're from Australia at the moment. But you do occasionally get the feeling that we might just had the "sound of the summer" already without realising it. With a freezing cold window and far-too-thin curtains by your side, the album doesn't have such an impact as a cloudless blue sky would. That's not to say you can't enjoy the work whatsoever; just perhaps not to the same extent. All the less, energetic highlights ('Brothersport' and 'My Girls') combine with ambient drones of calm ('No More Runnin', the climax of 'Daily Routine') into an album so narrow in scope of sounds but so adventurous in ideas.
It's difficult to pick a favourite mood or even a favourite song, at that. A combination of two might just be an answer to that. 'Daily Routine' begins with a crunching, dis-jointed organ line before emerging into a combination of heavy beats and rhythmically-aware vocals from Panda Bear. It further progresses into a blissfully, increasingly abstract wave of noise before eventually closing to the sound of a siren. That's a lot to get your head round in six minutes. The soothing yet fidgety number 'Bluish' is equally ambitious in its meeting of both relaxation and eagerness, with similarly impressive results. But it is the fire-starting frenzied side of the record that stands head and shoulders above all - 'Brothersport', 'My Girls' and the sheer intent during the climax of 'In The Flowers' kick you into action, require your attention; they're the ones that really make an impact. The opener commences in a sort of hungover-state; dreamy and not quite with it entirely. But the latter half of the song is a wiping away of any doubts fans had towards the album, a confirmation of the ridiculous level of buzz surrounding the band, all through the form of a joyful clenched fist of electronic rage. Thenafter, there's never a dull moment, especially not in closer 'Brothersport', which almost provokes an out-of-body experience. It gets you that carried away.
And so the only thing left to say is some sort of over-blown statement about how this album will change the world. Go ahead, call it your favourite album of all time. Go ahead, call it worthy of a 9.6 from the influential Pitchfork. Go ahead, call it undoubtedly one of the best albums of the 21st century. You might even be right when we look back on this.
Very Very Merriweather December 10, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
I heard this the other day (it was a journo promo - not a leak!)I can see why all the reviews are going nuts. It has the trademark experimentation but with added melodic flourishes and sky high choruses. Still very Animal Collective but letting more folks into their strange and beautiful world.
It has a bit of a Beach Boys harmonic happiness (if you're into Fleet Foxes this is like an electronic version from Brooklyn) Really poppy in places but not at all predictable. It's definitely a record to get you through the New Year blues, it's pure sunshine haze. A really wild and happy record
Amazing album... December 10, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
Could animal collective's latest album finally be the one to break them through to the mainstream? a totally joyous and euphoric extension of all that has made them such a lauded underground act over the past decade or so. the music here contains much of the sprit and blissful harmony of panda bear's classic 'person pitch' but is still distinctly animal collective in execution. a cosmic dance music of songs that stay swirling round your head for days. 'my girls' is an obvious highlight with an amazing pulse and groove underpinning shimmering keys and trancelike (in a good way) vocals. a record to cherish and champion and destined to be one of the highlights of 2009.
Truly exciting, original and innovative music!
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