I’ve always been a sucker for a drawn-out theme. Animal Collective is an experimental indie group (pysch-folk or noise-rock, some might say) who generally replace lyrics with guttural sounds, focusing more intently on the melodies and instrumentation of the songs than on high-school level poetry (finally a band that shares my disregard for lyrics!). They also run the Paw Tracks record label, which features other experimental acts such as my favorite Ariel Pink, who you’ll be seeing here shortly.

The band is comprised of a few punny fellows from Balitmore: Panda Bear (who recently released his second solo LP), the Geologist, (who wears a headlamp during shows in order to see his mixing boards and therefore looks like a “rock” scientist – bad pun of my own), Avey Tare (surprisingly not meant as a play of words on “avatar”) and finally, Deakin (who is alluding to 19th century literati with his nom de plume).

Below I’ve added my favorite songs from each of their major albums:

Animal Collective – Leaf House

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Animal Collective – Grass

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Animal Collective – Winter Wonder Land

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Buy Animal Collective’s Strawberry Jam at Amazon.com