Tunes: Are You Also Frightened?!?

Happy Monday, duders. I thought I’d start the week off with a small foray into a band I want to make sure we cover pretty heavily here on the site. That band is Animal Collective, a band you’ve probably already heard a lot of buzz surrounding already this year. No surprise there, especially considering that their Merriweather Post Pavilion release was extremely well received by the critics and fans alike. It was definitely something I listened to at least once daily for the last four months or so, so I guess you could say I enjoyed it quite a bit myself.

There’s something about this band that just immediately clicked with me once I saw this live video for “Brother Sport,” maybe right from the first vocals you hear out of Panda Bear as the video loads up. This music is just so insanely inventive to me, even if it probably is a ripoff of something else that’s already been done. Naysayers, be damned. This music sounds newer than anything that’s being put out these days, and the progression that this band has shown throughout their discography and live shows can not be overlooked. I’m only glad I just now discovered it before it’s too late.

One song you may not have heard much of if you only followed from the sidelines is the third track off the album, “Also Frightened.” To some it would seem that this would sound and feel like too much of an unconventional song and they might immediately just toss it off, but for some reason I found it to be the best on the album to me. Their arrangement on the album is definitely my favorite, and I think I liked it so much because I had heard some earlier live versions of the song — back when it was still called “Dreamer” — so I have a familiar taste in my mouth the first time I heard the album. But it was still completely new to me. That’s usually pretty impressive to pull off these days in the world of media over-saturation that we’re all navigating through blissfully.

So if you haven’t picked up the album, sample these earlier versions of “Also Frightened,” download the album, put on your headphones, huff a dozen whippits or so, and come back and comment and let us know how you feel. Let the buzz wear off first, though.