[ATTENDED: July 31, 2017] Animal Collective
The Mann Center is a gorgeous venue, but it’s a real hassle for us to get to–for a 7PM show it takes about 2 hours. Which is absurd. I swore we wouldn’t go back again, and then they announced Sigur Rós back in June and then Fleet Foxes and Belle and Sebastian this week.
So much for not going.
Well, this early show indeed meant that after two hours in the car we still missed at least one song from Animal Collective.
I’ve known about Animal Collective for a long time–they’re pretty legendary. I’ve never really gotten into them, although they do have a few songs that I like.
They are a headlining band in their own right with their own dedicated fanbase–who were out in force, dancing everywhere during their set. And checking recent setlists, it sounds like their shows are typically much longer than this one (about 70 minutes).
I’d heard that their live shows were really trippy and fun. And I totally loved their stage set up–cool and weird. Although I imagine their lights and backing video would have been more trippy had it been darker.
My thinking about Animal Collective is that they made interesting and bizarre noise collages–things that don’t necessarily resemble songs. They have gotten a bit more poppy lately, but I really didn’t know what to expect.
There were three of the Collective (Deakin was not with them). Panda Bear was on the left; Geologist in the middle and Avey Tare on the right. Each one stood in front of synth bank (no guitars) and there was a live drummer, Jeremy Hyman, behind them.
I certainly did not expect what we got–which was a lot of seemingly looped electronic music with vocals that were more howls and chants–I think there were words, but it wasn’t always obvious. And songs that lasted for ages. Since I don’t know the songs, I genuinely didn’t know if we had one long song or a bunch of short songs or what.
There were certainly a lot of people who knew what they were playing–I saw one guy singing along–but I wasn’t one of them.
The biggest problem was that it was all little too loud. If it had been a little quieter the repetition and yelling would have been interesting, but mostly it just kinda hurt.
There were moments of real coolness. At one point Avey and Panda sang counterpoint vocals that kind of played off each other. They were each getting faster and faster until it built to a huge explosion. (I’d guess that was in “Water Curses”).
As I said I do know some of their songs. I rather like “Floridada” which I was surprised they didn’t play. In fact, if the setlist online is correct, they only played one song form their new album (“Kinda Bonkers”).
They played 3 songs from their “hit” record Merriweather Post Pavillion and I think I liked those songs best. But I couldn’t tell if there were segues between songs or just jams or what.
On record, “Sweet Road” is about a minute long, but they jammed it for several minutes. I have four clips from it: One of the full band; one of Avey having a ton of fun; one of Panda yodeling the high part and there’s even one of geologist and the drummer doing their thing.
I enjoyed a lot of the sounds they made. Like what sounded like a cool zither on “Bees.” (I’m not sure what they used to make that sound, but it I think Panda was playing it).
I also enjoyed the high synth part of Daily Routine (and the accompanying lights)–also from Merriweather. My favorite song was Summertime Clothes. I assumed they be coming out for an encore, but nope. That was the end.
I didn’t really love the show. Mostly I enjoyed watching the Hyman on drums. He was a maniac back there, and yet the electronic beats were so loud that it wasn’t always audible that he was doing anything.
But the most fun thing was watching the fans really get into it.
- Lying in the Grass
- Kinda Bonkers
- Sweet Road
- Bees
- Daily Routine
- Guys Eyes
- Water Curses
- Summertime Clothes
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