Animal Collective: Merriweather Past Pavilion (2008)

Posted by admin on Feb 3, 2009 in Arts & Culture | 0 comments

Animal Collective’s eighth studio album, Merriweather Post Pavilion, is hands down the most anticipated album this year. Months before its release, elitist music magazines and bloggers heralded Merriweather’s debut as Animal Collective’s pinnacle album and the best of the year.

Since the album’s release, there hasn’t been much debate: the hype was right and the wait worth it. MPP takes singers David “Avey Tare” Portner and Noah “Panda Bear” Lennox’s vocals to new heights, and Animal Collective’s familiar neo-psychedelic electronics, compliments of third member Brian “Geologist” Weitz, to greater depths. The album sublimely captures Animal Collective’s watery electro-pop sounds and driving beats in a more polished package, resulting in their most widely-accessible album to date.

“In the Flowers,” MPP’s opening track, gives us a glimpse into the colourful and versatile experience the rest of the album delivers. Wind and waterdrop sound effects echo a ghostly piano as Avey Tare sings and the track opens up into an explosion akin to a light show finale.

“Bluish” and “No More Runnin” delicately display just how far the group has come vocally, while other tracks like “Summertime Clothes” and “Lion in a Coma” maintain the fun, somewhat eclectic, sounds Animal Collective fans have come to expect.

The album boasts greater precision and drips with a cool wetness, allowing, as the L.A. Times puts it, “rivulets of rhythm [to stream] down their surfaces like water running down a cave’s walls.”

At the top of the album’s hits are “My Girls” and “Brother Sport.” “My Girls,” the first single to be released, draws us in with a melodic synth-loop, while a driving bass drum and Panda’s vocals kick-in to build the track to an incredible climax. “Brother Sport” offers one of the band’s most mainstream sounds, yet it brings the album to another level as the soundscape created by the rise and fall of the ever-changing beat draws out the emotion, tone and depth of the album.

Merriweather Post Pavilion demands audiences listen, not just hear, to fully experience and explore the depth Animal Collective has uncovered. Loyal fans and first-time listeners alike won’t be disappointed.