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“We need them to be ‘considered good/relevant’ so that we can be ‘considered good/relevant.’ Now that they have ‘made it’, webzines/blogs/pitchforks can pat themselves on the back because this is our child. We raised them. We pulled them from the womb of the obscurity, raised them, fed them, nourished them, created them, loved them, used them, experienced them, grown with them, and now they have grown to have an alledged impact on modern society.” Hipster Runoff discusses how the praised-to-the-skies psych outfit Animal Collective “is a band created by/for/on the Internet,” and it’s probably one of the better deconstructions of that band’s hothouse popularity that I’ve read yet. [Hipster Runoff]
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It’s certainly very strange to see people jump on this bandwagon. AC is a band that, in any other era, would be marginalized as too strange and obscure to anyone other than like Forced Exposure junkies. It’s almost like their popularity (and many other bands) is a direct result of the +9.0 ratings they’ve received on PFM. Could be a gross generalization, but I feel like there’s some sort of correlation going on there, i.e. people go download/buy the top rated albums to prove they have good taste. Or maybe it’s just, why waste time on poorly rated records?
… um, I like their song that’s getting play on XMU… But I certainly don’t find them all that special. More special than this Fleet Foxes business. I think it was on here somewhere or in my head that likened them to the Nickelback of indie rock: the most mundane, lowest common denominator so you can’t say it is bad, but by everyone saying it isn’t bad, it is by default the best album of the year… I don’t know what that makes Animal Collective, but they’re certainly not the inverse of being too weird so everyone likes them.. so they’re just weird enough that people can like them and feel on the edge of progress?
That being said, my favorite song is still “Buffalo Stance”, so I’m not exactly the voice elite music criticism, but I’d like to think I’ve observed at least instances of the behavior I’m talking about.
So is that what a Canonical Great Album is–and has always been, then? Something that speaks the loudest to a generation’s self-regard and is otherwise just compelling enough to carry that burden?
@TheRunningboard7: dude, there is NOTHING wrong with having your favorite song be ‘buffalo stance.’ in fact, i wish more ‘elite music critics’ had the same position.
@Dickdogfood: maybe! although i wonder if the internet era hasn’t heightened those tendencies.
Am I the only person who has never knowingly heard a single note by this band?
I think, maybe several years from now, Pitchfork is going to reveal that this was all just a massive experiment – that animal collective is not a real band, and never was a real band, and it was all for the purpose of seeing how much the internet/indie/whatever world could be made to love something solely by giving them a lot of big pitchfork ratings.
@Maura Johnston: dude, there is NOTHING wrong with having your favorite song be ‘buffalo stance.’
What she said. Who the hell could complain about that song?
The AC album is fine, totally enjoyable, but nothing really to bother with unless you want to see what all the fuss is about. They still seem to love doing the “hey, how about we run the vocals through so many effects that the lyrics and melodic phrasing are basically indistinguishable.”
Forgotten in all this love/backlash/etc. about Animal Collective is this: What about the basic idea that a human being (like myself) could simply enjoy and be excited by a band’s music free of reading about them on blogs, posting about them on blogs, reading the news stories on Pitchfork, going to their shows, or talking about them to like-minded friends? At what point does all this hate for the idea of Animal Collective because of their fans and supporters turn into ignorance for the music of Animal Collective? Because until I started reading on this website (one of the only music “blogs” I actually follow) about how the Animal Collective were some huge cultural touchstone idolized and undeservedly praised by armies of wannabe Brooklynite hipsters around the world, I never would’ve guessed that they were. And yet, I still get excited when they release new albums, because I believe they are a a great band (not just good) with the potential to do something amazing. It needs to be remembered that someone can think that without having consumed any Kool Aid.
@Ned Raggett: ditto to that.
@Marth: You’re only saying that because that’s what they TELL you think!
(The larger point is a good one. For myself, I think they constantly promise more than they deliver and I will leave it at that.)
@Dickdogfood: I think, Miss America style, that that’s one contribution to the overall score. The biggest part, and this is the hardest to accept, is that the kids who are in middle school and high school right now will ultimately decide. When some of them go on to start bands, what will be their oft repeated touchstones? After all, isn’t that a contributing factor to the respect given to the Velvet Underground and the Pixies and Little Richard?
@NeverEnough:
Consider yourself lucky.
@Ned Raggett: (The larger point is a good one. For myself, I think they constantly promise more than they deliver and I will leave it at that.)
I would agree with that entirely. Despite all of the praise it’s getting, I think this new one (and Strawberry Jam, moreso) are actually fairly disappointing, compared to where I thought they could go after Feels (about half of which I think is absolutely perfect) and the last Panda Bear solo album. So yeah, to me it’s been all about their potential, ever since Sung Tongs. The only difference is that, in my mind, their missteps aren’t dealbreakers. I still honestly think they could release a record that just blows everyone out of the water. This new one (despite the rave reviews it’s getting–and maybe that’s part of the problem) just isn’t it. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be level-headedly enjoyed.
This whole thing makes my head hurt…
@janine: The biggest part, and this is the hardest to accept, is that the kids who are in middle school and high school right now will ultimately decide.
And that’s always v. important. I keep saying to folks — and sometimes to myself, at appropriate moments — ‘there’s a fifteen year old kid out there right now whose mind is being blown by something in the same way that happened to you at that age.’ And they will make their own decisions like we did.
I dunno, I *love* strange/obscure/borderline unlistenable music and I find AC to be derivative and boring.
@Marth: Damn… I just skimmed through the actual article to find that I’m one of the stereotypes listed. Foiled again.
two immediate thoughts when reading the article:
1) “Anco”? Have they branched into the petroleum business?
2) AC has definitely nicked the Sun City Girls’ mask approach in press photos, lock stock and barrel, haven’t they? (I know other bands have done similar in the past like Art Of Noise, but the actual masks themselves come straight outta the Sun City Girls’ playbook — perhaps with their blessing, I dunno.)
That was one of the better deconstructions of the band’s popularity? I mean, there were a couple of zingers but it was basically a shitshow.
Anyway, while I’m sure Animal Collective have benefited a huge amount from Pitchfork buzz, I just can’t bring myself to suggest it’s been any more than a catalyst for people to listen to them. I’ve seen mit mein own eyes people who sneer at Pitchfork yet love this band.
It could just be that they are a band people find interesting yet accessible.
@Lax Danja House: Minimalist yet expansive.
@juiceandgin: That bad? What do they sound like?
i can’t believe i read that entire hipster runoff post. the excerpt you quoted made the post seem mildly coherent… boy was i wrong. what a waste of my time. fucking lolspeak.
i’m with the consensus here that MPP is enjoyable, but nothing spectacular either.
The unabashed critical acclaim that AC is getting reminds me of the early/mid 80’s, when indie music magazines would be in lockstep about a particular band. I think some of this phenomena is due to two fears on the part of blog or magazine writers/editors:
- Fear of being left behind in the “hipness” sweepstakes, thereby making their blog irrelevant.
- Fear of losing access to bands for tracks and videos to post, interviews, etc. (if they dare be negative)
Keep in mind that people in their mid to late 30s or older in the 90s were saying the same types of things about Weezer. “It’s just bland college radio rock pop fluff.” Yet, Weezer have a huge following to this day, even post Red album.
Personally, I don’t get why Weezer were ever exciting, and similarly with Animal Collective now, but at the same time, I don’t want to be one of those curmudgeons that just dismisses and grumbles about bands like Weezer and Animal Collective for the rest of my music-collecting life. Why?
I’m happy for Animal Collective. Congrats, guys. Hopefully you guys remain right, and inspire other future, possibly greater bands. huzzah, d00d, woah, etc.
OK Final comment.
That Animal Collective album cover comes straight out of a U.S. government recognized textbook optical illusion
[kids.niehs.nih.gov]
Scroll down to the coffee beans, then scroll down a little more.
If there’s been anything that ranks as most annoying about the recent AC hype, it’s been the “WOAH DUDE, BEST ALBUM COVER EVER”. *Now* I know where to grab album covers to blow the kids minds in the future.
“DUDE, IT’S JUST A B&W GRID, BUT THERE’S, LIKE, FUZZY GRAY SPOTS IN THE INTERSECTIONS. FUCKIN’ TRIPPEE!”
@NeverEnough: Yo!
@Al Shipley: Yo yo!
for the last several years, we’ve despised the notion of overnight celebrity bands like Interpol and the Arcade Fire who’ve been canonized on the strength of one good album and a couple more less good ones. “where are the slowly-cultivated successes?” we wondered.
and now here’s animal collective, whose first album (which i’m considering “Spirit They’re Gone Spirit They’ve Vanished”) was P4K-approved about a decade ago and we’re going to actively hold it against them that their success has been a long time coming? as if that’s part of “what’s wrong” with them? is it their fault that we’re still dumb enough to care who the “next Radiohead” is going to be?
NOW HERE’S THE OBLIGATORY WASHING OF MY HANDS – i don’t even like Animal Collective that much. i certainly don’t know any of their rabid fans aside from what i read on the internet. rabid fans are the same on the internet or in Philadelphia Eagles regalia – scary and annoying. but i think the growth of AC’s fanbase has been as natural a thing as we’ve seen in the internet era so far.
over the course of a decade, their reputation has gone from “stuff for weirdos” (alternately, “who?”) to the “it” band of the hour – and we must all have an opinion. what were Vampire Weekend doing a decade ago? how about the now-yesterday’s news Interpol? insert the band you think represents 00s blog celebrity best. i know what Avey Tare and Panda Bear were doing – they were making self-consciously strange records that some people liked and some people didn’t. just like they are now.
fine – don’t like their records. there’s a lot not to like. but the backlash smells like all other backlashes ever have – it smells like this: okay, i don’t like something that many other people like, so there must be some phenomenon at work to explain why they like it, and furthermore something i can say to condemn their like as less genuine than my like for “Buffalo Stance” or “Year of the Gentleman” or you name it.
@westartedthis: Amen. The band didn’t just come out of nowhere. I remember Avey Tare and Panda Bear records at college radio in the early 90s.
@Lucas Jensen: Crap. I meant the early 00s. Wow. I’ve been working in/with college radio for too long.
I was about to say, the early 90s? My memory ain’t that bad!
“…so there’s a Guadalcanal Diary album and there’s this Nirvana band people keep talking about and hmm, Panda Bear? What, is this a C86 band?”
Ned, don’t you remember Panda Bear opening for the Sugarplastic at No Life Records? shuh.
Between HRO lately and that 33 1/3 Celine Dion book, this January has been full of massive truth bombs in the weirdest places. Hopefully this will continue.
I saw AC once live and hated it, and I hate their records. Much like Broken Social Scene, the boundless critical acclaim didn’t create my dislike for them, but sure as hell amplifies it.
@westartedthis: i don’t think that the fandom isn’t genuine on some base level. what has bemused me about the reception animal collective has received in the runup to mpp’s release is that it has borne a startling resemblance to the reaction that, say, tokio hotel gets on message boards. even though animal collective fans are largely probably horrified by that band/the jonas brothers/insert the next teen-girl-squad sensation here on a purely aesthetic level. so the question for me becomes, well, what’s the fundamental difference between the anti-marketing of animal collective and the blatant marketing of tokio hotel? is there something happening here where sort of fandom we’re seeing by people who balloon pre-release threads about albums into a thousand-plus pages is endemic to the internet, simply because saying “i like this” can very easily be blown out of proportion by the hothouse nature of commingling with others who share your same interests? (cass sunstein’s republic 2.0 talks about these tendencies, albeit in regards to political discussion online.)
(btw i finally listened to the record, as i resolved earlier. it’s really not for me.)
@mackro: I’m sorry, I was too busy looking over Beatnik Filmstars’ seven-inches at the time.
@chachwitablog: the masked maurauders of the 21st century.
I completely disagree that AC is a band created “by/for/on the Internet.” They drew a lot of publicity from print magazines (anybody remember those old things?), four to five years ago. I never heard about them until I hear one of their songs on a Wire sampler CD. AC already had a large cult following and some significant college radio play by the time that the blogger/web zine hype kicked in.
@NeverEnough:
Experimental, noisy, non-melodic. I just don’t get them I guess. When I hear some of the compliments bestowed on this band or any band for that matter, I expect to be blown away. Maybe my expectations are too high.
@Maura Johnston: that’s interesting. i don’t intend to immerse myself in yet more message board comments to see first hand the comparisons you’re talking about, but AC’s rise to popularity reminds me of another group’s – TV on the Radio. here’s a decent review (a strange review that spends its entire word count talking about how much they suck, but gives them positive scores) that seems to insist that TVOTR’s “greatness” exists in the minds of the internet echo chamber – [www.cokemachineglow.com]
and i think those are valid points w/r/t Animal Collective, too. but why aren’t there weekly take-downs of TV on the Radio here or elsewhere? it’s as simple as that you like their music and you don’t like AC’s. and there’s nothing wrong with your coverage of either band. it’s just funny how with one we choose to exist outside the echo chamber and just enjoy something, but if this week’s “record no one will shut up about” is something we don’t like, writing a music blog becomes pretty exhausting when every third or fourth item in your RSS feed is hopefully not related to Merriweather Post Pavillion.
specifically addressing the HRO article, it’s funny when it’s trying to be funny and sort of overreaching and bad when it tries to actually make a point. though the one i agree with is that the band isn’t likely to get much more popular than they are right now or “cross over” even in the small ways that Arcade Fire or even Fleet Foxes have. i remember when Animal Collective did “#1″ on Conan O’Brien. the look on Conan’s face basically told the story of AC’s dismal hopes for future network TV appearances.
which is really the difference between them and Tokio Hotel. actual records sold/times played on MTV/etc. everyone freaks out in the pre-release hype stages, and the reactions always look similar because there isn’t anything to actually discuss yet. since the album leaked, it’s been almost anticlimactic – it’s just music after all, and 9.6 notwithstanding, it’s probably the least dynamic, least interesting album they’ve made yet. i’m not upset if people are declaring it the album of the year already – those people are a vocal minority, as they will be in december of 2009 when they’re still probably calling it that.
is it not also apparent that everyone was talking about it because it leaked during the holiday lull and there was nothing else to talk about? this record comes out the same day as Antony & the Johnsons’ new one as well as Andrew Bird’s, followed closely by Franz Ferdinand and former “10.0″ dignitaries Trail of Dead. the P4K crowd will not be at a loss for other stuff to talk about soon.
also i sometimes don’t realize how long-winded i’m being. whoops.
@westartedthis: be as long-winded as you like!
i guess i don’t see the “it got lucky because of timing” correlation, or the tvotr comparison. i mean, this was an album that had listening parties for it some three months before it was scheduled to come out; our roundup of reactions to the new york party got a steady stream of google-driven traffic since it was published. (using ‘leaked’ in the title helped, ha ha.) and like, i’m sorry, but i don’t see the level of fan craziness with any other “indie” bands out there right now; there’s passion, sure, but this is next-level. i think in part it’s because while the boundaries between journalist and blogger and superfan and regular old fan are collapsing, this record (and its predecessor!) had its arrival trumpeted by its publicist announcing that only the select few people who had long lead times for their publications could hear it, and that everyone else would have to wait. in the age of leaked albums and instant gratification, this is kind of a genius strategy! it’s the equivalent of the girl who’s driving you mad saying that you can only feel her breasts through her shirt until you decide to get married. (and yes, i’m deliberately using a female as the desired object here.) i do hope that the other albums you mentioned begin creeping up in the conversation, but all the early-wad “BEST!!111″ blowing makes me wonder if we’ve reached some sort of weird crest of excitement for at least six weeks or so.
@Marth: Ditto to your point that many listeners simply enjoy listening to AC regardless of the media hype. BUT, there must always positively, absolutely be some shadowy play by The Powers That Be who shape our “collective consciousness” and dictate our music tastes – or else so many critics would have little to write about.
It get the feeling there are some good things being discussed in that article, but I just can’t read/comprehend it as written. I’m not familiar with that website at all, but I think the same can be said for every other article I just checked out on that site: something interesting is being said but that is based on assumption, as I can’t actually read any of it.
@juiceandgin: Given my hatred for Sonic Youth, I can’t imagine ever liking this.
Well, okay, awesome? Does that mean we can move on to a new topic? I’m only being slightly facetious.
Also, confused as to how people don’t understand the meta satire of Hipster Runoff?
@westartedthis: I will agree with you that the AC hype is very similar to what TVOTR dealt with last year.
Only I don’t know what blogs you’ve been reading, but I feel like I’ve seen nothing BUT takedowns of “Dear Science” almost as quickly as it was canonized. Since we’re sending all of this traffic HR’s way, here’s his take on TVOTR:
[www.hipsterrunoff.com]
And to echo many posters here, I simply will not hold bands accountable for fan/media reaction. It doesn’t mean I have to like/support those bands, but I can’t hate on TVOTR simply because some asshat thought it would look good for them to pick “Dear Science” as their album of 2008. I mean, TVOTR didn’t even warrant a feature in RS last year (and that cursory piece in the “Rock & Roll” section just doesn’t count).
PS: I’ve been a fan of Hipster Runoff for a while now. That kid is hilarious.
Hipster Runoff=Encylopedia Dramatica? Now I get it.
On a vaguely related note, I got my first “If you like Animal Collective, you’ll love…” PR pitch of 2009 on like the 5th, which is like a day after everyone goes back to work. I have a feeling that phrase will be this year’s “combining the ____ of Radiohead with _____”
I think it’s best to simply listen and spend some time with an artist/band and their output, decide if I like it and go from there. If I don’t like it, fine, I’m out. On to something more up my alley/the things I took a break from to give said artist/band a shot. I find it’s more fun to wax poetic and lose sleep over music I actually like. Not speaking on the musical output of Animal Collective per se, just saying that when it comes to enjoying music, I’m more of a lover, not a fighter(hater/one who whines/etc).