[Pan]

lol

here is a few more

Avey Tare on the recording of Sung Tongs

Spoiler: show

kapkana:
this is really for avey andor panda, i guess.
i don't think you've talked much about the sung tongs recording sessions and song developments much. can someone talk about this? specifically the incredible percussion, i guess. what a beautiful album.

Avey:
i had really nice pictures of the sung tongs session on a disc somewhere and now i cant find it. If i could i would share them and i do think they will turn up somtime. Yes the hades thing is pretty much how it was, red all the time. Lots of mountain dew for me cause its the only soda i drink really and it has lots of caffine in it. Later on we switched to fat tire beer cause its a good brew for that area. Lots of singing and messing around with doing vocals in all parts of a room. It was basically like a two bedroom house but the living room was all cement...thats where we recorded and the bedroom was where we set up the mixer. Its on the property that my parents live on in lamar colorado. We rented a bunch of mikes here in nyc and took my eight track out there with us. Rusty would just listen to every song as we would play it live and walk around the room for awhile and then decide how hed want to mike the guitars. Noah and i both did the percussion during over dubs throughout the session as well. The first time we played back who could win a rabbit after we recorded the initial tracks we just cracked up and said "holy shit, we made that????...."

davery

antenna builder:
what kind of equipment were you guys using, along the lines of mics/compressors/computer or station or tape? i think one of the most impressive parts about that album that i dont hear many people talk about is how well you guys mixed it. everything is perfectly transparant and panned in such inventive ways n shit -- i could really go on but i won't. headphones and weed and sungtongs and im seriously on fucking mars listening to martian music. bravo.

Avey: yeah we recorded it on the same tascam 48 (half inch 8 track) that i recorded spirit on and the drums guitars and early electronics for danse manatee. that is we recorded the acoustic guitars and the vocals on 8 tracks. Then we mixed it down to rusty's sony laptop and recorded many vocal and percussion over dubs. Hes been using that for years. We mixed it from that onto....somthing..(i cant remember) at noahs mom's place in b-more. It was very cold so we had to wear jackets the whole time. We added in all those samples and electronics there. We mixed for awhile so its sweet you like the mixing. Oh and we used AKGs and an old ribbon mike to record with. Though we had a pzm and some sm57s that we might have used as well. I remember using the pzm to record me slamming the door of the house which is what that distorted rhythm track in kids on holiday is. The person talking at the beginning of wcwar is someone in a deli in my neighborhood.

daevery

Avey:
in terms of magic sounds and things id like to keep some things secret..sorry. Yeah if you listen closely there are lots of one line samples in we tigers...its all noah and i and every thing is a one line to friends of ours or someone we had met in the past year or so before that....listen closely and youll hear someone whisper "christ"

daev

Geologist on playing live and recording Two Sails On A Sound

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jyork: two sails on a sound is one of the most mesmerizing songs i've ever heard
how did you guys record it, and did you ever perform it live?

crap, that didn't come out as well as i wanted it
i don't know exactly what i'm asking
i guess i just wish there was more information/bootlegs from the here comes the indian era

and yeah, i know the boxset is coming out with live hcti stuff

god knows i can't wait

uh
thanks

Geologist: yeah we played it live a lot. usually closed with it when we did it if i remember correctly. or did we start with it? i can't remember. it was pretty much just how it is on the record with the exception of the piano and some vocals. like everything on indian, we recorded it live, probably in one or two takes, and then the vocals and piano were overdubbed later. it's actually a pretty composed song, though the boundaries are loose and how long it was changed night to night based on how fast we moved.

Avey Tare and Geologist on recording in Tucson and album themes

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equaldancing:
How did you guys end up recording in tucson?

Geologist: that's weird...we haven't yet and i wasn't aware that we had said we were going to, but yes we will be early next year. we always try and go somewhere different to record; somewhere we can get away from everything else and just focus on being with each other and putting the songs to tape. kind of like how rocky goes to south central LA and russia to train in rocky 3 and 4. it's not so much about a particular city than an environment. like spirit is very northern maryland, indian is very city, feels is very pacific northwest, etc. dave and i were talking a few months back about environments to record and one of us was like maybe it'd be sweet to make this next one a desert record and then everyone was like yeah man we haven't done that yet and it seems like it could fit the songs and the way we want them to sound. that might not make sense to anyone but us because when you think of the desert you think of twangy guitars and morricone soundtracks and jim morrison walking with the ghost of an indian, but we don't really see it that way. we looked at a bunch of studios from southern california to new mexico and settled on one we liked in tucson. plus i've spent about a year and a half of my life living in the tucson area, and the other dudes have always liked it when they came out to visit me or when we've driven through on tour. so that's where we'll be.

codenoise: panda spilled the beans to pitchfork in a recent interview.

i love how you guys give each album a theme. next one = desert. feels = love & purple. sung tongs = red. interesting way to ground the sound and give the albums more of a flow.

Avey: actually those are all different things for us...I wouldnt say desert is the attempted theme of this record but really just a new place we would like to experience recording as we all really like it. Feels was definitely purple and love as a theme but the light we used while recording was actually orange. We usually try and record with different colored lights on so we will have to pick a nice one this time around. Though i do think the desert will inspire some new things in these songs, like brian said i dont really think its gonna turn out to be much of a "desert record" in any traditional terms cause i think we already have a a mood we are going for with most of the tunes......i guess really we just think the desert will be nice...

da

disslunker: [on geo calling Indian "city"] that is the exact opposite feeling / visuals i get for Here Comes The Indian. whenever i describe animal collective to someone who is unfamiliar with yr music, i use the term 'crazy fucking electric jungle music' and then i play something from Here Comes The Indian for them. the whole album just seems like wandering through a forest high on acid or mushrooms or something far removed from civilization / urban life.

i guess its just a take ive never considered before

Avey: yeah ive never heard bri talk about it that way either (indian that is) i always thought it was more pacific island vibe actually..there was somthing very island carnival esque about slippi when we first started playing it. That and all the boat sounds and ocean references always made me think about jungles and beaches and oceans...but once we recorded it, it some how became a lot darker to me and totally feel you on the forest vibe plus when we started doing interviews around that album thats really when all of the forest and drug questions started coming at us so it seems alot of people hear it that way...

da

Geologist:
couple things...sorry to change your vision of indian...i was merely talking about the environments i associate with the records based on where we chose to record. i guess that time we didn't really choose to do it in new york but just did it out of necessity and wanted to do it with nicolas at his studio. i do see indian as very tropical, though the other dude sometimes think it's too dark to see it that way. but when i think about that album (haven't listened to it more than once or twice since we did it), i think about the concrete floors and burned rugs of our old practice space, walking by broken glass outside the rare book room studio on the way to the corner deli, and sleeping on dave's floor in bushwick. it's hard to separate that album from new york in my mind. same with hollindagain and danse manatee to a certain extent. kind of like how pavement said everyone thought crooked crooked rain was the perfect california record, and even though it does sound that way, to them it's all new york since that's where they went through that experience. i read that in the reissue liner notes and found it interesting because no matter how close the listener and the artist are in terms of how they see a record, the artist has specific memories and experiences tied up in the sound that can't be shared. but i apologize if i ruined your view of the record. however you see it yourself is most important anyway.

and i wasn't referencing wayne's world. i was referencing the oliver stone doors movie, which is what wayne's world (actually wayne's world 2) was poking fun at. not that there is anything wrong with quoting wayne's world,it's a pretty funny movie. my girlfriend's best friend moved to delaware not long ago and whenever we go visit her i think in my mind, "hi, i'm in delaware" and start cracking up. the second one kind of blew, but it has some quotable lines too. here's one for davey..."we had to beat them to death with their own shoes."

will update the original posts later I promise

[honeyfuckles]

thought I'd help out and provide a few

Avey Tare on the origin of Leaf House

Spoiler: show

Avey: wow..[House of Leaves] sounds cool...

doesnt have anything to do with the song though...yeah that song is about the house noah grew up in...

daevery

Avey Tare on laughter during the Sung Tongs tour

Spoiler: show

Avey: Laughter was somthing that occured very often during that year of touring. I think during that brighton performance it was more the case of the lyrics making people laugh actually. I have a bootleg of noah and i's first tonic performance and its a similar case. As we started playing the songs more and getting a little more loose with them i think people that had never seen us before just didnt know how to react to how we would act on stage...i.e. noah making sexual pleasure sounds during good lovin outside or just our overall wildness made people laugh for some reason. At one of our mum shows in portland a girl even asked me if it was ok that she laughed during our show, i mean she was wondering if we intended that. Its not somthing that we thought about, i mean weve never really wanted to be seen as a jokey band but at the same time i would hope people would laugh while we play. Does that make sense? We were laughing so hard at some jokes during practice yesterday that we could barely get any work done. Id say overall laughter is a good thing.

Geologist on playing old songs with their new songs live

Spoiler: show

Geologist: well i guess it's not totally accurate for us to say that anymore because we kept playing a few feels jams after we recorded that, and one or two sung tongs jams. but that sort of arose out of necessity because up through feels, we had all lived either in new york, or close to new york when writing together. actually i guess we worked on banshee and people after we had spread out to our current locations. this new one we just recorded was the first one where it was written entirely during a period of us being split up. before each tour we got together for a week or two to write new songs to play on the tour. each time we wrote 4, so by last march we had the 8 you guys have heard. we got together last september for a month to work on lots of projects like the film and the boxset and we wrote 4 or 5 more during that time but decided not to play them live. but for the two big feels tours, we never had enough time to write a whole new set of material (and by "set" i mean the 90+ minutes we play these days - it was easier in the days of 20-40 minute sets) so we kept some old songs around that we still enjoyed playing. it felt weird, like breaking a commandment or something, but it ended up being enjoyable for us and the crowd. we had played one or two sung tongs jams in early feels shows, but that was different because they were either reworked, or they were songs joshmin and i liked and had fun playing with dave and noah.

so anyway, we're obviously open now to playing older material, but don't get excited and think everything is fair game and start throwing out requests for every song. we have to remember it well enough to play around with it, and it depends who is on the tour which influences how a song is done, or even whether or not it can be done. for this upcoming tour...well, don't have much concrete info right now. josh has told you guys that he's taking a bit of a break from the rigor of the road so obviously that will effect how dave and noah and i do things. the future is unclear, but it's kind of fun and exciting. dave and noah and i have been discussing new ideas for new jams on a regular basis ever since we left the studio and have started working on things on our own. as has been the case for the last two years, we'll get together for a couple weeks before the tour and see what we can come up with. we'll of course strive for as much new material as we can, maybe think about reworking some older jams, but we won't know for certain what we're gonna play until the day before we leave, and i guess neither will anyone else. we still haven't even mixed this new one yet - start on saturday, so there is a lot going on in a short time period. wish us luck.

Deakin on the 2004 Tokyo Bootleg

Spoiler: show

Deakin: just for infos sake... panda and i did a three day tour of japan in february of 2004 without geo or avey. i think you are hearing the drunken results. our friend taka the old turtle who was escorting us from kyoto to nagoya to tokyo got us a bottle of whisky for that show. we did share some of it for sure, but not most of it. later that night taka took us and another friend to his local bar which was very old and wooden and occupied only by two elder women. myself, noah, taka, the two old women and the bartender with the vest and the garter rolled sleeves kept the room warm until the sun came up. at one point the bartender sat down at the piano and accompanied one of the old woman singing All of Me by Cole Porter. we returned the favor when they took down an old guitar off the wall and handed it to us. i have no memory of what we played though i am sure it was spontaneous. a few hours later we were on a plane back to NYC to begin our first U.S. tour of the Feels era. Seems like a long long time ago.

josh

Avey Tare on the main instrument used in Bees from Feels

Spoiler: show

Avey: hey..

its an autoharp and ive always played the autoharp live as well, though we havent played that song much live. Noahs backing vocals inspired us to make it sound like its some kind of mountain scene with rain and bees and....mountains hehehehe. So we are all kind of playing a part in that scene and we recorded it live.

I tuned the autoharp that way so the chord changes fit the tunning. I came up with the vocal melody as we recorded it. I had a weird obsession with bees around that time. I still love them too.

does that answer yr question...

Daevre

[Pan]

thanks man!
did not know about the autoharp

[popeye]

i really wish at least dave still posted here :L

[honeyfuckles]

ok one more

Avey Tare on Peacebone and wanting to keep their musical process vague

Spoiler: show

Avey: I think we've basically talked about this in a number of ways but maybe we just arent being clear. We are usually pretty vague when it comes to our musical process i suppose but i kind of like it that way. I wouldnt want to come on here and tell you how we make every sound and every song cause there is a mystery to it all that i like to keep and i think there is a otherworldly aspect to alot of our songs that (if i were the fan) might be ruined if we really broke it down. Thats not to say there is some crazy alchemical process that we use (or is there hehehe) i just dont really like to talk about it so much.

every song is different in the way that we go about piecing it all together, but for the most part the melody comes before everything else and then everything else is sort of shaped to that. I think that the personality of each song can be attributed to the fact that we all have a different outlook on the song and are able to add something to it that not only reflects our own personalities but also contributes something that the others wouldnt have thought of. since you asked about peacebone.. i wrote the vocal line to peacebone in my head and then i made that pulsey track (its not really a loop) that has all the chord changes in it and brought that in played it for the dudes and sang the melody over top of it. I always wanted the steel drum line in the chorus to be in there but didnt try it out until we were in the studio. Everything else was made by the other dudes as we played it more.

Da

[Zero Cool]

the band on their favourite Ariel Pink song

Spoiler: show

Panda: he dudes
it changes all the time but its been interesting results for a while for me. ghost off of loverboy sometimes too. hes got many many.
hope you guys are good
peace

Hey, hope everybody's great! I've been reading this thread and it's amazing.

I just want to know what does Panda Bear wanted to say in his reply to "the band on their favourite Ariel Pink song" Does he said that he likes two songs? or does he only says that he likes"Ghost"? because his line goes like this: "he dudes
it changes all the time but its been interesting results for a while for me. ghost off of loverboy sometimes too." when I read that I think "he dudes" is a song but I've been searching and the only thing I found related to "he dudes" is an album called "Yas Dudette" maybe that's what he was referring to ???

Could someone explain me what does Panda Bear wanted to say with his reply, please?

[GeckoSushi]

yea I have Yas Dudette and there is not a song called "he dudes" on it. I think he just misspelled hey dudes, as in referring to us. Interesting Results is a track off Worn Copy, and Ghosts is a pretty rad song, cool that he picked that. Those are the only two songs he mentioned.

here's my translation of what he says
Panda: he dudes Hello forum people
it changes all the time but its been interesting results for a while for me. my favorite Ariel song changes all the time, but for a while it was Interesting Results.
ghost off of loverboy sometimes too. hes got many many. I also like the song, Ghosts off of the album Loverboy sometimes. He has a lot of songs
hope you guys are good Hope you guys aren't eagerly awaiting more posts from me, I have a family to take care of
peace bye bye

[Zero Cool]

Thank You Myles_Dunhill Now with your translation it all makes sense

[angel`inheavysyrup]

hey folks

good to see this has been archived again, i spent a while assembling a similar archive on the last ac board. it seems these sites just keep disappearing.. nice to know there's somebody keeping these conversations around.

thanks pan!

a.

[Pan]

decide search the webz for more of this stuff and I hit the jackpot

Geologist on self-producing, their use of engineers and misc

Spoiler: show

Geologist:
whoah, all these questions right away...i'm leaving for the airport in 8 hours and i need to pack! this is the answer to the second question. first off, we don't work with "producers". we've always produced our own records. not to take away from the engineers we've worked with because their talents and techincal know-how has played a big role in helping us achieve what we want, but we've always done the orchestration, been in charge of how a record sounds, and picked the songs we record and how the album is sequenced. as for choosing the engineers, i guess we mostly choose the engineers first but that doesn't always mean you have to go to their home studio. scott will travel to a foreign studio for this one, and rusty travelled to dave's parents house and recorded sung tongs there. finding and working with them has never been difficult for us, but maybe we're just lucky. nicolas, rusty, scott (the only 3 we've worked with) and chris (our live sound guy) are all been open minded people who have been involved in underground music for a long time, and we knew them on a personal level to a certain extent and knew we'd get along with them. i mean scott records the sun city girls, nicolas records black dice, and chris runs fusetron, so they need no convincing that someone can be creative and make worthwhile music without being technically trained and studied. we definitely have to get along with them though, and i don't think i'd ever want to work with an engineer who was crazy good, but wouldn't add to the fun, because making records is a lot of fun for us. for me personally it's the most fun of all the activities we're involved in.

Geologist:
if you like rain in songs you should check out calcutta codeine come but sun city girls. i think that has a rainstorm sound in it. i personally am not a fan of that sound in songs, so i don't think i'd ever do it, but i never say never.

anyways, we actually don't have internet at the house we're staying at, so we'll only be able to go on the web at the studio, and when we're there we'll mostly be working so you'll hear from us less than maybe we thought. today is the first day and we're setting up and getting ready to go. i don't think we'll be updating you guys on what we're recording or what we're doing with the songs, but everyone likes surprises right?

Avey on the band's earliest musical endeavours and the influence of psych/sound music on it

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CrystalTambourine:
Hey i was just wondering when you guys were young aspiring musicians before ac, what were you into, what kind of music were you making, and what did you listen to for inspiration. Thanks i was just wondering about this because i myself enjoy making music and i wanted to know what it was like for you guys in your "early years"

Avey:

brian and i started making music together when we were 15 because of our shared love of the band pavement and horror films. We started doing covers at a highschool "cabaret" that included pavement songs, cure songs, poison by belle biv devoe, seasons in the sun by terry jacks...or maybe we never actually performed that one but we did practice it, and just what i needed by the cars. From there we started taking acid and putting improvised sections into our first band called automine which deakceon also played in. a guy in this old baltimore band called space 11 saw us play at our highschool and told us we reminded him of early grateful dead and syd barret era pink floyd so we decided dig back into our old record collections and get back into that kind of stuff which we had given up for a bit. We read a review of a climax golden twins record somtime around 11th or 12th grade bought the record and from there we were completely into sound music and whateer weird psych music we could find. A friend of ours got a silver apples album on tape also around the same time and this led to us discovering can and krautrock stuff etc. I guess in highschool we made so much stuff that its all varied sounding. I made three or four 90 minute tapes full of solo songs which were all different sounding. Noah had just about as many plus he and josh did quite alot of stuff together too. Our band was more rock with organs and delayed guitars, and brian and i also had a duo called wendy darling (shining reference) which was probably closer to what ac stuff started sounding like. We used a drum machine though. We were also very inspired by the soundtrack to the shining which has the brilliant "music for strings percussion and celeste" on it by bela bartok and well as pieces by ligtei and pendereki and the texas chainsaw massacre movie and soundtrack inspired us alot too. This was all in highschool though these things remain an inspiration.

D

Deakin on his solo material and taking a break from the band

Spoiler: show

Deakin:
hey y'all,

haven't been on here for a long time. thanks for the interest in my stuff. I have done a lot. but most of it has been pretty unfinished and unpresentable. But it is still really important to me and I am hoping to spend some time this year making more music for myself. I can't promise that I will ever want anyone to hear it, but I want to make it.

Also thought I would use this as an opportunity to let you guys know that I am most likely taking a break from touring with the band until sometime this fall. It was a hard choice to come to, but for a myriad of personal reasons I decided i would benefit a lot from spending a little less time running around the world. I hope to be feeling really psyched and reenergized to rejoin the clan this fall after our record comes out. time will tell.

right now i am thoroughly psyched in tucson making this record.

thanks for listening,

joshmin

Geologist, Avey and Scott Colburn (scooter) on producing and mixing feels

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solarkg:

Hi... just wondering what the mixing process was like for your feels sessions. How much of the effects were pre-tape and how much was post-tape? Did you use any new equipment? And was it mixed using ProTools or DP or something? Thanks, I've just been really curious.

Geologist:
none of the effects were done in the mixing process. at least none that i remember. the mixing was done on computer. scooter was at hte controls and we sat on the couch behind him giving our directions. i can't remember what computer program it was. i know it wasn't protools.

Colburn:
Feels started on tape and ended up in Nuendo. effects? well what _is_ an effect. The vocals had effects on them, but they were no different than the effects used live. BUTT, each vocal track was recorded with 6 microphones, thereby creating a whole new effect.

Panda? effects? sure!

Geologist? effects? yeah!

Deakin? effects, mmhmm!

Avey:
There is no kick to start with...we use somthing like an octave divider on noahs floor tom and its done live. there was some post production tinkering with the drums but not much. Like geo said most of those effects are done live.

Davey

Avey on Feels' artwork

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disslunker:
I'm pretty sure I read earlier that the artwork for the album was created by one (or more) of you guys...

I recently stumbled onto artwork made by Henry Darger and its almost scary how similar it is. Obviously not as twisted or dark, but the feeling is there so to speak.

Avey:

Yes surprisingly everyone that interviews us now asks about that. Ive been a fan of dargers stuff for some time now but didnt really have it in mind when i made the cover. I found a childrens educational guide on the street and thought some of the images fit the sound and the lyrics perfectly (kind of how i felt about the original spirit album cover when i ripped that off too) so i cut them up and used them. I guess the similarity is there because darger taught himself to draw by tracing similar images and magazine cut outs etc. Theres a sweet documentary about him called "in the realms of the unreal"...atleast i think thats what it is called. You can probably rent it if you have access to a decent video store....

If you like more personal or outsider visual art and writings maybe you should check out stuff by adolf wolfie or robert walser as well. Both guys are really cool and had interesting lives as well.

Davey

Avey on his troubled time at college, its infleunce on making spirit, his time at a summer camp and Neutal Milk Hotel

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Avey:
After highschool i moved to nyc to go to college hated it but eventually found a nice place here in nyc with amazing friends. Brian and i mostly spent the weekends hanging out in our dorm rooms drunk or stoned or tripping and listening to records. I spent every summer back in MD where Brian josh noah and i would get together regularly to play music. I guess my bummer of a time at nyu inspired me to write some of the songs on spirit such as alvin row and april and the phantom and chocolate girl all of which i can remember writing and recording on a four track in my sophmore year dorm room. The rest of the songs i either wrote when i was younger (ie penny dreadfuls) or right when we were recording.

The last summer i went back to maryland i worked at an outdoor camp for kids called nature camps in northern maryland. It really changed my mood and my outlook on life completely which was a drastic turn from dark to light. It was probably cause i hung out in the thick maryland woods most of the time and slept outside alot without a tent. I did my fisrt sweat lodge and it was amazing. I was twenty then. Its also the summer noah and i recorded the drums/piano/acoustic guitar for spirit and noah must have just turned 21. I spent the rest of the year untill december going back to maryland on the weekends to do all the overdubs.

I listened to the second neutral milk hotel album a fair amount in college but like alot of indie rock from the ninties it has made no lasting impression on me and i dont think ive listened to it since then.

D

Avey and Deakin on wearing masks, the infamous edgar story and halloween

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Avey:
honestly josh and i are the only two of us who ever used the masks. Josh for HCTI and me for our first two years of playing. I cant remember tho if he and i always wore the masks during the hcti tour. Noah used to wear a panda hood on his head when we first started playing then just kind of started putting make up on his face and once wore a white wig all the time when we toured in europe. That was a really weird time for noah. He insisted on us always calling him edgar and so we had to introduce him to all the promoters that way. I remember once he took morphine that i gave him and he was all drugged up when we were out with the promoters and it was really funny cause he could barely stay awake and we were all like "awwww come on edgar..stick with us keep going". Kind of like what i sing in infant dressing table. We nick named our driver eric the red and he accused rusty santos of stealing money from us but it was really josh and not rusty. Brian has only ever wore that headlamp. He does it for the most part so if the stage is too dark he can still see his mini disc players and what track he is playing.

I guess we started wearing masks cause we wanted our shows to incoprate some kind of world that wasnt your every night kind of club experience and that the attention wouldnt be focused on dave portner, noah lennox...josh etc. (as personalities) We thought wearing this kind of stuff would also help us be more relaxed and find an easier place in that other world we wanted people to join us in. I guess in the same way weve started using the lights now, tho i think now in a way we are trying to get the attention off of us completely. We stopped wearing the masks cause we felt like it could become too gimicky...as youve pointed out you heard we were a band that wore masks...i think we just wanted to make sure at a certain point that the music was the most important thing, even in terms of the performance. I think in a certain way the lights and other visuals can achieve this too by taking the focus off of us.
I think in regards to photos to me its just more interesting. Most people see that photo of noah and i in the rabbit and turtle costume and make this masked band assumption from that i think. I really like the photos that brian's friend took at that shoot. i tend to not like any photos of us that arent more visual. I find band photography pretty boring so we have made an effort sometimes to spice photos of us up a bit more but magazines tend to never choose those photos. I really dont like the one of us where we look like some weird metal band and very angry and i have that funny red hat on. I like the one of us that our friend adriano took with the white back drop where we are all laughing tho.

D

Deakin:
the aussie tour masks were somewhat inspired by halloween. that was the 3rd? maybe 4th halloween in a row that we were out of the country. since halloween doesn't mean much most places outside of the U.S. (or at least doesn't mean the same thing) we usually feel like we miss it. 2006 we were actually on a plane somewhere over the pacific ocean on halloween. dave and i had been talking for a few years about making masks with flowers. somehow we got psyched to do it for that tour. it was fun, although my mask was more difficult to play in than i was prepared for.

i got so tired of missing halloween though that i decided to quit the band. sure enough... those dudes went on tour again right over halloween. me and my sister from another mother, nina, got dressed all up ad dead and gave out candy to the kids and then cruised around nyc checking the sites. good vibes all night. zombies on fences smoking cigarettes and checking out girls. i got mistaken for beetleguese about 12 times. got me all psyched for next years halloween.

apologies if there is any overlap

[Pan]

Geologist and Avey on why Hollinndagain is a live album, Forest Children Risen, Baby Day and Ice Cream Factory

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Geologist:

i don't know if i remember the events well enough to point out a moment that would answer that. in my memory it just kind of happened that way. st. ives asked us to do one of their limited lp's and we had never done any studio versions of those songs so we decided to release those live versions because we thought they were sweet sounding, and did the songs justice. the wfmu radio session sounded great to us after we did it so that was a no brainer. as for why we never did studio versions of those songs, that i'm fuzzy about. we were playing them at shows around nyc for the first half of 2001, which was also the time we were recording and mixing danse manatee. so the hollindagain jams took up our live time and the danse manatee jams took up our recording time. i sort of remember some talk of recording pride fight and forest gospel and releasing an ep with those 2 and forest children risen and ahh good country. all four of those used similar styles of playing the acoustic guitar in a percussive way so they seemed to fit together in our heads. but that talk didn't go anywhere i guess. then we did the dice tour, and after that i took off to travel for the summer and when i got back we decided to start playing with all four of us there and just started working on new material. so the hollindagain songs just kind of left our minds and we never got around to them. the era seemed to have ended. the st. ives offer came after we had already started writing here comes the indian, and we thought it was a shame we never recorded or released any hollindgain jams so it offered us a sweet opportunity to do it.

jdmayer:
I was gonna ask sometime if Forest Children Risen was a DM b-side, guess it is.

some confusion between forest children risen and forest gospel

Geologist:
neither track was a danse manatee outtake. there were no outtakes from that record. i actually don't think there were any outtakes from any studio sessions until feels. before that all other comp tracks or bsides or whatever were recorded on their own specifically for the release they ended up on. forest children risen was recorded many months before danse manatee for that japanese compilation. forest gospel was written before we recorded danse manatee (i think), but it was never in consideration to be on the record. at that point we pretty much had all the songs written for danse and knew what would be on the record. things like pride fight and forest gospel that were written during the time of that recording already felt like a new kind of thing that was separate from danse manatee to us.

Grox:
what about baby day and ice cream factory?

Avey:
Ice cream factory was written for the second hcti set that we wrote for our 2002 tour. We played it three times i think. Once at tonic, and two times on tour. The tour attempts didnt end up going so well so it was just one of those songs we stopped playing. i guess by the time we got back we just didnt think about recording it. The same thing sort of happened when we turned it into 206. It just never felt right to us so we never recorded it.

Noah i wrote baby day on our first trip to europe so wed have a different type of song to throw into the in stores we had to play. I remember he and i and david grubbs were staying at our friend dave's who works for fat cat. I just started singing noah the melody and we just started clapping and he added the harmonies. I dont think it was ever anything we planned on recording but when the idea for the wcwar single came up we were in maryland and around alot of recording equipment so we thought it would be cool for a bside.

Geologist:

just to be clear, ice cream factory (and the 206 version) don't exist in a b-side version or whatever you want to call it. like dave said they were never recorded so a few live versions are all that exist. a lot of people hear 206 and think it's one of our other drawn out slow jams from other records.

Avey on College

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ogerrob1487:
as i understand geologist was finishing up grad school during the recording of sung tongs. well i was wondering if the song college had anything to do with his being in grad school and not recording on the album? thanks again.

Avey:
actually i just threw that line in there to make it funny and to be anti beachboys cause the song is so beach boys to begin with. You know its like the anti..be true to your school mentality of the fifties. Also noah and i are both college drop outs and yes its somthing i do believe. Its not like i think noone should go to college but i think alot of kids are pressured by their parents or schools to keep going when its somthing they are either unsure about or dont want. I think its created a society of young people who actually dont even care about learning and only care about having comfortable jobs (and they arent even that comfortable) because they are lead lto believe thats whats best for them. It also makes alot of young people scared to do what they actually believe in and be less independent. Americans in general are just scared. Anyway I do think there are plenty of people like brian for instance who know exactly what they want to do and utilize college for their benefit and thats sweet. I think its positive that brian has that as a part of his life and i cant really imagine him without that. The point being we didnt say dont go to college we just said you dont have to go to college.
But also most colleges and universities really arent worth the amount of money you pay for them. Somtimes you can learn just as much out of school as you can in and for alot less money. I guess i just wonder what else that money could be used for.

daev

Geologist and Deakin on how they feel about albums they are not on, hcti tour, campfire songs, prospect hummer and a quick reference to the mysterious Spirit show of 99

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ogerrob1487:
hey i was wondering if geologist or deaken feel awkward when asked about an album you werent featured on. do you feel like its not your place to comment on those albums? just curious. thanks.

Geologist:
i don't know if awkward is the right word. it's not embarrassing or anything. maybe if i was asked not to play on a record when i wanted to, then i would feel weird, but every record that's been done without me was done when i chose to leave the band for a while or when i just couldn't be there because i had other things going on. i feel bad for the journalist if its an interesting question that deserves an answer and i'm not able to give it to them. i feel fine commenting on those records because its easier for me to listen to them and love them as opposed to ones i play on. and if its just a factual question i know the answer to, i'll answer it. but if i'm asked about an anecdote or the motivation or inspiration behind something i'm not a part of, i'll decline. sometimes when we're dividing up interviews we ask if they're looking for answers about a specific album and then we know who should take it but since most interviews these days focus on feels or live shows, it hasn't been hard and we haven't had to do that for a while.

zoombiniss:
so what exactly were the reasons you and josh wasnt part of the albums?

im guessing spirit was pretty much a solo thing for dave
and hcti you guys werent getting along or something EDIT EDIT EDIT:::::::so it was only dave and noah on sung tongs

but that still doesnt explain the others...

Geologist:
we all did play on here comes the indian, so i'm not sure what that means. let's see, there are 3 albums i don't play on,oh and prospect hummer for the most part:

spirit: yes, was supposed to be a dave solo record but he doesn't play drums so he asked noah.

campfire songs: was a pre-animal collective idea of dave and noah's. dave and i actually did perform baby canteen at a show in new york in 99 with some spirit songs. but when it was being worked out for recording and josh joined the project, i had gone to europe for a few months and then back to bmore because september 11th cost me a job in new york and i was broke. i was present for the recording though and helped out with the tech side. i read a book by candlelight while they played each take because it went into the night. sounds like a peaceful experience...recorded on a screened in porch. but we never mention (or may be we forget) that it was the middle of november and pretty fucking cold out there.

sung tongs: right before the tour for here comes the indian material, i found out i was accepted to my top grad school choice and that required me to move out to arizona. i still wasn't sure i was going to go and i didn't tell anyone i was accepted when we set out, but then we had a terrible 3 days on that tour in the pacific northwest where the van kept breaking down and we had to borrow money to get it fixed to we could keep going. they were pretty much the days that broke me. we also had broken equipment and other crazy dramas back home that happened those days. at that point we all knew we'd get back from tour, record the songs, and then we needed space from each other, and we still had more than 2 weeks left on the road. i was sitting on a rooftop by myself in san franciso and out of nowhere i just called the school and said they could expect me. an impulse decision that turned out to be one of the best decisions i ever made because i loved grad school. i went downstairs and told the dudes that after the era was over, i was heading to the desert for a full year,and that's where i went. when i returned in summer of 03, dave and noah had written sung tongs. there was talk of me sending them field recordings through the mail but i was kind of in my own world out there, and i only sent one. terrestrial tones used it instead.

prospect hummer: this was recorded on a tour that i couldn't go on. it was still back in the days of working a day job for me and i had been awarded a fellowship and a grant that i worked my ass off for and was super-psyched to get. my supervisors actually were really generous in giving me time off to tour and of the 3 AC tours that happened while i was working there, they let me go on 2 of them, but that prospect hummer one happened less than 2 months after i started the job and that was too early to take time off. had i gone,i would have been fired, and like i said, i loved the job and was psyched to be doing it.

those are my stories.

Geologist:
yeah sometimes its weird to talk on here and i wonder what details are appropriate, but i just kind of think of it like an interview. if i was asked that in an interview i would have said the same things. and all the details i gave are things we've said before or were my own personal details. as you noticed i won't answer for josh.

Deakin:
Brian got it all about right. I will throw in a little about the weren't getting along bit and what I was doing during Sung Tongs and Danse Manatee.

In the spring of 2000 I decided to leave school for a while. A while later become permanent, but that is another story. That summer I felt obligated (appropriately so) to spend the summer in Maryland working off some substantial debt to my mother who had been supporting me in school. It was that summer that dave, brian and the newly arrived noah found a way of playing together that was very new to them. By the time I arrived in New York they had really found a way of translating what they had discovered to a live setting. It jsut wasn't the place for me to jump in. That is sort of a central philosophy to the music that we make. that is that we feel that time and place and ciircumstances are often as much a part of the composition process as... well... the composition. I was very enthusiastic and supportive of what was going on and was pretty involved in what we were doing. I was still running our record label and I came out on the road as a roadie/tour manager and a friend for the first tour with Black Dice.

HCTI was a new era and we all felt excited to find something new together. It was in a sense the first time that all four of us had played together. It was in many ways a great time. there was a lot going on creatively. this thing about us not getting along is a lot more complicated than I think that you guys mean when you say it. I don't really feel like going into it because it truly isn't really anyone's business. clearly it wasn't the end of the world as I still consider noah, dave and brian as my three closest, dearest and important friends.

By the time Sung Tongs started to happen I was dealing with a lot of things personally and wasn't really available to play music in any substantial way. I was for one thing really diving in to carpentry. I love building things and this was a very full time thing for me at that time. I was working between 40 and 70 hours a week and for the most part loving it. It is a whole other side of me that is really important and I needed to be doing that. The first time I saw noah and dave play a sung Tongs show, i was tearing up. I thought it was beautiful and I still do.

it has certtainly been a strange journey so far, and it still goes. How lucky we are.

Deakin sufficiently and humorously explaining what the sample on Peacebone is saying

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CVanOeveren:
is it bonefish or boneface?

the writeup for the peacebone video by domino says it's boneface, but it sounds like bonefish to me!

Deakin:
BONEFISH.

[valar602]

Thanks a bunch!

[jibkidder]

eyvand kang! didn't know about that. story of iceland is my shit circle of fair karma

[Fovrodi]

Aveys too, he listed that as an album of the year when he was working at Other Music

[lucasmoreira]

wrote:

We nick named our driver eric the red and he accused rusty santos of stealing money from us but it was really josh and not rusty.

[jibkidder]

I started a toy keyboard orchestra at the time, TKO and we played that piece, much like a gamelan piece, very elegant and simple

[popparen]

Avey Tare, Deakin, and Geologist on movies (misc)

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Avey: I think maybe i have too many movies i like to name any specifics as favororites but i will say that the only time i think bresson and i fully agreed on our mutual distaste of a movie was when we watched magnolia together. I think it reached a point where we were both saying out loud "please just end already". It was that scene were they all sing that stupid song that really put me over the edge.

ey, this ain't right. you can't say that about magnolia.

[Pan]

Oh i have that one posted already

It is too bad they don't dig it
avey is not too keen on pan's labyrinth either

[popparen]

yeah, I was quoting you at first but fucked up.

I agree with avey about pan's labyrinth but magnolia and pta means a lot to me. made me get into movies and all that.

[Fovrodi]

Painting With AMA

On experimental music

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Q: To me, a lot of your early music, particularly Danse Manatee, feels very spectral, in that it seems to work in pure frequency and timbre, with structure as a secondary constraint. Were you being actively influenced by spectral/experimental music at the time, or was this something that you followed intuitively as you began playing together? As you move towards more tightly structured music, as on Painting With, do you find yourselves placing that same emphasis on frequency, texture, and timbre, or have you begun to consider these elements differently as your music has evolved?

A: HI! Yes we were listening to a lot of experimental music. I did a radio show on WKCR (this i geo) which was more noise and experimental stuff. It was a lot of drone stuff. Alvin Lucier was a big one. We also liked Music for the Broken Ear by Maryanne Amacher, which influenced the high frequencies on Danse Manatee. I think we still value all that in our music, but maybe not into the extreme highs as much hehe

On working with Vashti Bunyan

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Q: Is it true that the band met Vashti Bunyan while in Edinburgh ? Could you perhaps talk more about how Prospect Hummer came to being through this meeting ?

A: hey its avey,,,
yes we met vashti through kieren who does fourtet. she came out to one of our shows and we kept in contact. because she start working with the label fat cat they sort of made it possible. she is an amazing person and it was an amazing experience. the songs on that record we had actually written for sung tongs.

On PW samples (Geo)

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Q: Thanks for taking time to come into the sub. I’m a huge fan, and I can’t wait to see you in Atlanta this May! [...]
For Geo: Where do you find a lot of the samples you use in songs, other than the “field recording” method I’ve heard Avey describe in a previous interview? I’m particularly interested in bits such as the guitar noise at the opening of Brother Sport, or the woodwind sample in Lying in the Grass.
Again, thanks for your time!

A: HI it's Geo. For the new record I decided not to use samples from other people's music, which I did a lot on CHz. I did more what Noah did on PBVSGR, which is use royalty free sample packs and then try and bend them into my own thing.

Geo on his contributions to Baleen Sample and Seal Eyeing

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Q: for Geo: The AC tracks Baleen Sample and Seal Eyeing sound very similar to me, with the sound collage-like style they're in. I remember reading somewhere that Baleen Sample is almost entirely your work but I could be wrong. Are these mainly your songs? They're some of the most relaxing things I've heard

A: Hi, Geo here. I actually didn't really play on Baleen Sample. All those sounds of mine on there were on a minidisc Dave found that we'd used in performance many years earlier for band we had called Come Winter. They were all horror movie samples. It's not whales at all. Dave and Josh processed them somehow and stuck them in that song, but I didn't know about it until I saw the credits. And Seal Eyeing was more conscious in terms of my input, but not my song. Dave is doing the piano and singing. I can't remember what everyone else did, but everyone plays on that song.

Avey on reissuing older (fat-cat) albums on vinyl

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Q: Some of your most popular and acclaimed records like Spirit They've Gone, Spirit They've Vanished and Panda Bear's Person Pitch are currently rare and expensive on vinyl. Any chance for reissues anytime soon?

A: HI, we actually just started getting rights back to a lot of the back catalog and we're going to figure out a system where we can just print them up on vinyl ourselves with help of our distributor. However that is not cheap, and usually there needs to be some sort of demand to justify the up front costs

On their sample-picking sensibilities

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Q: One of my favorite aspects of your music is how you incorporate such an eclectic variety of samples ranging everywhere from Liszt to recordings of Saturn’s rings to clips from The Golden Girls. I was wondering, do you actively seek out samples or do you just happen to stumble upon them and think, “that’d work there?”

A: Both. Sometimes we know what a song needs and go looking for it, but sometimes we just hear stuff and keep it. Like on PW, we heard the dinosaur vocal sample at the beginning of Hocus Pocus on the radio while driving and instantly wanted to use it, but for the Golden Girls, we knew we wanted samples of them based on the content of the song.

[Setlist spoilers] On re-introducing old songs to live shows

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Q: In videos of the new material being played live, the band seem to be having a lot of fun and with some rarer older songs being played live (especially Alvin Row) it is nice to see the energy of the crowd play off that of the band. Did you bring back a lot of these rarer songs with the intention of creating this energy or did you feel they fit in with the Painting With material ?

A: It's always nice to bring back old jams. We really had to focus mostly on painting with songs for this tour because we never played them live before and we were the most excited to play them. The old songs that we chose seemed to fit with the new ones. I'm sure we will add a few more jams as the year progresses - avey

Panda on his favorite ice cream flavors

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Q: What are your favorite flavors of ice cream?

A: hey this is noah...mint chocolate chip is one of my favorites especially in shake form...i usually stay away from the chocolate based flavors...im down with pistachio and coconut

Demo-itis vs. Studio-itis

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Q: One thing the band avoided with Painting With due to its inception in studio as opposed to on tour is "demoitis". Does the band suffer from a similar thing where songs released on record are perhaps now completely different from how they'd be approached now ?

A: It was crucial to keep in mind that we weren't going to sound exactly like the record. But there's always a very specific energy that goes into playing live so it's sort of happens no matter what. It took a little to get used to but we are feeling really comfortable with the songs now.

(Geo's) Favorite silent/b&w films

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Q: Hi! I would love to ask, what are some of your favorite silent and/or black and white films, and why?

A: Women in the Dunes is great B&W. Also Begotten, which is tough to watch and not really a favorite of mine (this is geo), but the contrast looks awesome. Danny Perez loves it and it was an influence for the urban creme part of Oddsac

Panda on writing Person Pitch

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Q: Person Pitch is an album that is very near and dear to me. Could Noah perhaps talk about the inception of some of the songs on that record ? Also, perhaps why there was a decision to use Samplers instead of instrumentation like Guitar, Piano etc.

A: hey glad you like that one...i had just moved overseas when i started making those songs and hadn't brought a whole lot of gear with me...i had begun making songs on the sp303 back in new york but most of the songs came together after the move...it took some effort to get my guitar into the country but i was happy to try making songs a different way

Geo on the best book he's read in a long time

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Q: Hey guys! Have you read any books you liked lately? Do you have any favorite books?
A: I read Sleep Has His House by Ana Kavan last year and it was the best book I've read in a long time - Geo

Geo on old NYC haunts (music venues, restaurants)

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Q: Hello I had so much fun seeing you guys on Tuesday night. Seeing as you all lived here in NYC at some point, was there any cool venues or restaurants that you guys still miss, and is it still around? Or anywhere new that you've found since you moved away? Heard you went to a Nets game....
Hope you are all having a great day!

A: Hi it's Geo. I will always miss the Cooler and Tonic. Great venues where we saw some mind blowing shows. I like that Sake Bar Decibel is still there and looks the same. I found it one night when I was 18 because it seemed they wouldn't card me. They were playing a Cornelius album. Then I took Dave there the next night. We had never had sake before. Right now I make it a point to go to Cocoran Soba every time I'm in the city.

Avey on Spirit

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Q: What was the recording process of Spirit like in general? How long did it take and how long did you have those songs before you put them on the record? Were there any songs that didn't make it on the album?

A: A lot of the ideas I had for spirit came in the summer of 98. I wrote most of the songs from 97-98 except for penny Dreadfuls which I wrote in high school and then changed the lyrics to fit with the albums theme. The recording process was sort of long because I was in college at the time and all of my recording gear was at my parents house so after Noah and I recorded the foundation tracks (drums and piano and acoustic guitar) during the summer of 98 I spent the next year taking the bus back to bmore from New York to do over dubs and mix it. The only track I did from that era that is similar is a cover of fleet wood macs dreams.A lot of the ideas I had for spirit came in the summer of 98. I wrote most of the songs from 97-98 except for penny Dreadfuls which I wrote in high school and then changed the lyrics to fit with the albums theme. The recording process was sort of long because I was in college at the time and all of my recording gear was at my parents house so after Noah and I recorded the foundation tracks (drums and piano and acoustic guitar) during the summer of 98 I spent the next year taking the bus back to bmore from New York to do over dubs and mix it. The only track I did from that era that is similar is a cover of fleet wood macs dreams.

Geo on making music for films

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Q: Do you think you might ever work on a visual project again such as ODDSAC, or maybe, even do an original soundtrack for a film? Really interested in the way you guys approach making music in a visual/environmental sense. Also, loved the new record, very psyched to see you at the Fonda next month!

A: Hi Geo here...We'd love to, but nothing planned right now. I think scoring a film would be great. We wanted to do some sound design for Danny's new film Antibirth but timing made it tough. There might be some stuff in there that we sent him but I'm not sure. I haven't seen the final version yet. We got asked to do some music for that movie Limitless while they were filming it, but when we talked to the director he just wanted something that sounded like an instrumental version of Summertime Clothes which we weren't very excited about doing. We also did a song and some sound design for an add-on for Red Dead Redemption, but it got rejected.

Hardest album to write, record, and mix

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Q: Which album was the hardest to write and record ?

A: I would say centipede hz. But strawberry jam was actually the hardest to mix.

On Jeremy Hyman joining them for the tour

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Q:Question for Noah (mostly): is it a little strange for you having someone else (jeremy) play the drum stuff that you would usually do on tours/records? is it strange having someone tour with you that isn’t part of the normal process of animal collective records?

A: hey thanks for the question...its been really great to have jeremy playing on these songs...hes got a muscle-ey and loose style that i think brings something good to the kind of hyper precision of the newer songs...weve all known jeremy for a bit so it wasn't like having a stranger on tour...hes been great

On mexican food

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Q: Do you like mexican food?

A: hey glad you like the album...i like it too...i do really love mexican food...i dream of taco zone in echo park

Avey on screaming in songs and Slasher Flicks

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Q: Hello guys! Thanks for stopping by this little part of the Internet.
This one is for Avey,
I’ve always loved the way you screamed in songs and wish I could make my screams sound so “pretty”. Anyway my question is, has the screaming affected your voice over the years?
Also planning on doing anymore Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks? Because that was my jam for quite a while.
-Bert

A: The screaming side of my singing is something that developed over time and seemed natural, especially in the live setting. I don't think it's effected my voice. I think it's inspired by other people who make screaming sound pretty as well. John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, the four tops.
No plans for more slasher at the moment.

Panda on vocal warmups and Geo's headlamp model

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Q: AV and PB, Do you guys do any vocal warmups before live shows, specifically in this new tour for songs that include hocketing?
Geo, what current model of headlamp are you using?
Thanks for doing this AMA guys!!!

A: hey...dave and i sing some to warmup for shows...most days ill sing a bit to myself throughout the day...brian says his lamp is a black diamond

Panda on Destiny, his personal Reddit acct

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Q: Wait.... are you really panda bear? and did panda bear post in the destiny subreddit?

A: hey yea that was me...think i was trying to find a raid group? i can't remember...kind of loved that game but I've been less interested since sparrow league

Geo on most challenging songs to play live

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Q: I'm very curious to know which songs are either the most challenging or the most fun to play live.
Thanks! -TJ

A: I think for me (geo), the CHZ songs were both the most fun and challenging because I did a lot of the bass with Moog Taurus foot pedals. So that set of songs felt more like drumming to me in terms of using my whole body. A lot of times I had to use both feet and both hands throughout the entire song. But I think the singing guys would have different answers. That is a whole other level of difficulty. I have to do the vocoder part on Golden Gal on this tour and sing the whole time and challenge of finding places to breathe and swallow (and not cough, which is hard during cold season) is more than I thought it'd be. And I only need to do samples with my hands. Don't think I could do a keyboard line and sing at the same time without a lot of practice.

Geo's favorite sea creature

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Q: Hi guys! I have a question for Brian.
Brian, what's your favorite sea creature, and why?

A: Shark. Don't know why. Loved them as long as I can remember. I dive with them a lot and they never fail to amaze me. Josh and I did a dive last year with about 100 hammerheads. So epic.

Avey on musical visions

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Q: Hi there! I really like the different forms that your albums take and how each embodies a different set of ideas, feelings, colors, etc. How do you work through conflicting visions of what an album or even a song should be? When I play music with my friends we often have different visions and it's hard to always find a middle ground. Sending positivity- thanks for doing this!

A: We always seem to agree on the visions we are having which I guess in a way is what makes it all work. But I think it's fun to be able to share different visions with friends. - Avey

Avey on the future of Down There's B-Sides

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Q: Is there any chance Dave will release some of the songs he played on his Down There tour? Also please make Eric Copeland come play another show in Chicago. That was a such a treat thank you.

A: I probably will never record those songs but I do have a practice session from right before the tour which I've thought about mastering and just putting up on the website. Eric is the man.

Geo on what he does during down-time (musically or otherwise)

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Q: This is for Brian/Geo - I asked you after the Boston show if you had any plans for a solo album and you said you didn't have any plans for now. I'm just wondering, though, between the albums when Noah and Dave are working on their solo stuff (or AnCo just isn't working on anything) are you just not working on any music? Or do all of your ideas just feed into the next AnCo project? Do you have a bunch of music somewhere that was just demos and experiments that may not see the light of day?

A: I mess around with stuff just to keep active. That often goes to future AC stuff. I had a ton of unused loops and samples lying around which is where my side of New Psycho Actives came from. And I did a solo set recently of stuff I make with my modular system. I used to do environmental policy volunteer work in between AC albums and tours, but as I got older it became harder to find old colleagues in DC that could help me get interesting things to do.

Geo on "hocketing"/dual voices and modular synths

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Q: I've heard the dual vocal style used on some of this album described as hocketing, but it sounds more to me like you guys are doing a sort of acoustic delay. Is this a fair assessment? And were the lyrics to On Delay inspired by this at all? Or maybe it's pulling from the history of being a band in Brooklyn in the 00's?
I'm also curious about the use of modular synthesizers on this album. I'd imagine that since you guys were probably taking live performance into consideration, that the approach was to create a versatile patch that could be re-used for multiple songs. Am I on the right track there? How was your experience with that?
Really psyched to see you guys in Seattle! Got my fingers crossed for Recycling!

A: This is Geo. We actually didn't really know the term hocketing before the dudes started doing it in the studio. So not sure how to technically put it as one or the other.
You're right about the modulars. They were used a bunch on the record but to undo and repatch for every song wouldn't make sense at all for live stage. But we have them up there with simples patches that do a handful of simple things and then we just use them here and there in the improvised moments. I guess I use it a little in Floridada and Loch Raven and Bees, but those things came from improvising on the patch in rehearsals.

Avey on musical styles, summarizing PW, and Recycling

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Q: Hey there! Thanks for doing this. Loving the new jams! I have a few questions over here. You don't have to answer to everything though if you don't want to:
1) Painting With was a collection of sweet, short jams, which are amazing by the way, but this left some of the fans craving for more of that old ambiental stuff. Do you plan on returning to those long, droney soundscapes you had going on in, say, Here Comes The Indian or Sung Tongs sometime in the future?
2) Have you heard Deakin's new stuff? If so, did you like it?
3) Avey did a thing on his AMA where he described each of his albums in one word. Can you guys do the same but with Painting With?
[s]4) What's your favorite painting?[/s][not answered]
[s]5) I know you guys like the movie Hausu (Geo owns a shirt of it as well). When I watched it it instantly went up to my all time favorites. Do you know of any other movies that are like that? Movies that feel like a child's wild imagination.[/s][not answered]
6) Recycling is my favorite song off your new album. Panda's vocals are so on point on it. I noticed some similarities between that song and Peacebone, more specifically the intro - on both songs it starts as a weird noise that slowly turns into a fun beat. So, did you use Peacebone as an inspiration for Recycling?
7) Lastly, do you have any fun moments from the recording sessions to share with us that you haven't shared already?
Stay awesome, Animals.

A: No we have not given up that style of making tunes or sounds it's really just not the kind of record we wanted to make this time around. I think if you check out the live show you'll see a lot more of that kind of thing. It's hard to know how to answer people when they ask "will you ever record a record like hcti again?" Because it seems like such a subjective question. No we won't ever record a record that sounds exactly like those records but we haven't become disinterested in that kind of music.
Yes and yes.
Black moon. The Czech version of baron Prasil.
No. One of my favorite vocal things we did is on that song actually. After the "who needs slicker tools line" that we sing we do a cascading harmony that kind of reminds me of the 7 dwarves. I think I needed a little Disney in there.
The whole thing was fun.
Avey

Geo on Hockey

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Q: Hey guys! Big, big thank you for doing this, you guys are my favourite arists and a huge inspiration to how I write music and my way of thinking. Thank you so much! Questions:
[...]
And this one's for Brian: I love that you're a hockey fan! I read the Pelle Lindbergh article you wrote for Sports Illustrated and thought it was the coolest thing. How about some comforting words for a sad Montreal fan? Thanks!

A: You have maybe the best goalie in the world coming back from injury next season??? I was hoping you'd keep the Cup away from DC at the start of the season, but you're letting me down. And now Giroux's missing multiple games with a concussion from Subban's dirty elbow to the head last week. Hard for me to feel bad for you, sorry! I do love Montreal though. Hard to really hate on the Habs. They are classic. Glad you liked the Pelle article. I'm working on a second one now that might be posted in March if the editors dig it.

Panda on getting interested in making electronic music and first gear

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Q: How old were you when you became interested in making electronic music and what was it that inspired you? What was the first equipment you bought?

A: hey this is noah...i was maybe 12 or so when my family got a synth called a korg 01...i began making sequences on that thing but i don't know that id heard much electronic music yet...my brother was down with some of the early moby records...a couple years later i heard a record called uf orb by the orb and that really kind of set me off and sent me exploring backwards

Avey on collective unconsciousness and synchronicity

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Q: Hi guys! Thanks for doing this AMA. One question.
Do you believe there is some sort of a collective unconscious in our world?
I find myself constantly realizing and discovering people in mass being connected or in tune to similar ideas and art. Just wondering if you guys feel that connection and if it inspires or affects your creative process.
Thanks for the wonderful art and pumped to see you guys in Chicago on Saturday!

A: I definitely believe the collective unconscious exists and things like synchronicity are a part of it. I think you just have to be open to it. I think once you start thinking about things whole heartedly then they become a part of this natural pot of ideas floating around. I think I got into this while I was writing the songs for feels. For a couple years before that I started seeing purple everywhere. I couldn't escape it. So I thought I must be tuned into some greater thing happening around me.
- avey

Avey on the possibility of an EP following PW

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Q: Hey Animal Collective!
Most of your albums have been followed up with an EP and they are all great. Fall Be Kind is one of my favourite releases ever. Are there any plans to do that again this year? Don't want to sound to demanding or anything I just really like your EP's

A: We love eps. we have a couple extra songs and have talked about writing and recording some more but have not put those desires into action yet.
avey

On future live releases

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Q: Do you have any plans to release more recordings of your shows soon? I saw in a recent interview Dave mentioned that you guys would eventually like to have a section of your website for recordings, that would be awesome!

A: We hope so! We record them all with multitrack, which is a blessing and a curse. It can sometimes lead to being too picky about mixing before releasing it. We mixed the 9:30 one with Brendan Canty from Fugazi and their live archive is a big inspiration. We talked to them about what a crazy intense undertaking it was and one of the things Ian told me was that they always just recorded their shows L/R, which took away the mixing decisions. If they had done multitrack like we do, they'd never have been able to get the archive ready because of all the decision making involved in mixing. They also were diligent about recording every show themselves. We assumed our fans would take care of it for us, and they've done a great job, but now we feel we should shoulder some responsibility too.

Panda's favorite video games

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Q: Favorite video games Noah?

A: ape escape...red dead...katamari damacy....shadow of the colossus...pro evo series...rampage...nba jam...grand theft series...nba 2k12...tony hawk 2...skate 3....world court tennis (turbografx)....destiny...bad company 2...

Avey on field recordings

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Q: First off, I want to thank Avey for making Down There, which is a fantastic album I don't think gets the respect it deserves as its a unique look at depression. One of the things I really like about the album is the field recordings you did for it, and I wanted to ask if you guys still carry field recorders out in public randomly? If so, what do you think is the favorite thing you've picked up on them that you used or didn't end up using for a record?

A: Thanks. I often do carry a field recorder around places. I used to do it a lot in Brooklyn and that's where s lot of the samples on sung tongs come from.
I spent a lot of time collecting specific field recordings for down there cause I had such a specific vision for it. I'm glad you appreciate it. I collected a lot of Flanger pedals for that too ha.
AVEY

Geo on working in ocean policy for Congress

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Q: Brian: In a similar vein, I remember reading that you took marine biology in college and I think I remember something about you wanting to go into politics at one point (forgive me if I'm wrong). Did Animal Collective just sort of happen to you, or did you take a calculated leap getting into music?

A: Geo here.. I actually worked in ocean policy in Congress for a year and that was while we were writing and touring Feels. We toured during my vacation time. I assumed I'd keep doing environmental policy but took a couple months off in between jobs so we could record Feels and then a tour offer came in so I extended my hiatus and then another tour often came in and now it's been 11 years. So yeah for me it just happened. Wasn't calculated at all. But I also hoped and assumed we'd all play together throughout whatever life choices we made. We started playing together so young that the idea of it being a career wasn't a motivating factor. Just good times.

Panda on Shadow of the Colossus (the game and the song)

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Q: Hey Noah, I wanted to know the significance of shadow of the colossus off of PBMTGR. Is it named after the ps2 Classic? If so, what did you like about that game and do you consider it as one of your favorites.?Are you looking forward to the last guardian? Love your work dude!

A: hey thanks...i love the game and i felt like the process in the game of scaling and defeating demons was relevant to stuff being talked about on the album. i am looking forward to last guardian but trying to temper my expectations

[Warning: Depressing] Denying a song request

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A: This is going to be long so bare with me. My biggest interest in life is music. It's my major, my only hobby, and it's helped me through so many hard times. My biggest inspiration when it comes to music, and life in general, is my brother. He's the reason I've made it this far in life and the reason I actually want to keep going.
On February 27, 2015, my brother died in his favorite city in the world, Columbus, Ohio. And as the 1 year anniversary (is that what you call it?) of his death approaches and emotions in my family are high, I am so happy to say that on February 26, 2016, one day before the year after his death, I'm seeing one of his favorite bands of all time in his favorite city. One of my biggest regrets is not going with him to see you guys play at Bonnaroo 2013 and share that amazing moment with him, because those are the moments I'll never get to experience with him again. With that said, I know his spirit will be with all of us on Friday, and I'll finally get to see Animal Collective play live with my big brother.
Now for the question. Let me preface this by saying that I know how unrealistic this is and I fully expect you guys to say no, but I would hate myself if I didn't at least try. So here goes
Could you guys play Brother Sport at the show tomorrow? It would mean the world to me and my (would-be) sister-in-law and I know my brother would absolutely love it.
P.S. thank you guys so much for everything you've done. You've helped so many lives.

A: Hey man, sorry to hear that. Can't even imagine how tough it must be. Unfortunately we don't have anything prepared for Brothersport, so as much as we'd like to lift your spirits in a time like this, we aren't capable of it. Sometimes it'd be nice to just be a band where the live instrumentation is always the same for every song and we could just go into whatever we wanted to play, but we just aren't that kind of band. We need to bring samples with us and practice the songs when we bring them bak into the set. 1000 apologies.

Panda's favorite place in Maryland

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Q: What's your favorite place in the great state of Maryland?

A: hey this is noah...ive always had a feeling about port deposit...we used to drive on the bridge above it twice a week when i was in high school and i always felt like there was something i should see down there...i haven't made the trip just yet but i hope to someday

On Recycling's meaning

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Q: What is the meaning behind the title of the track "Recycling?"
It sounds like it could have been from the cutting floor for PB meets the Grim Reaper... wonder if that is why it is called recycling?

A: recycling as about being a creative person and about making things that are shared with others...i suppose its about being a band as well...i was thinking a lot about the comings and goings of things and noticing patterns and cycles so that title came from that

Avey on internet music culture

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Q: Hey guys. Really loving Painting With, have it on right now actually. Luckily, there are no dinosaurs to worry about at the moment.
Question: Do you think that internet culture, particularly how much stock is put into reviews and reactions, is hurting music? I love the amount of music discussion and sharing that we all have access to now, but do you think it’s starting to become overkill?
Saw your Philly show by the way. It was awesome.

A: Hmm if anything I would think the fact that music is just available for anyone to hear when they want would be the helping or hurting factor. I've found too often that people's opinions on any given musician or album is too varied to be able to trust one voice so I like that I can listen to it myself and decide how I feel about it. I've always gotten music recommendations from friends though never blogs or mags. At least in the last ten years. I don't know anyone that sits around reading that stuff. The music blogs I enjoy say very little and just provide the tunes. I think people that are passionate about music will make up their own minds about it. Whether it's effecting the quality or not I can't say. I do think people seem to have less patience for music these days. Seems like records come and go and very few stick with people.
- Avey

On favorite comedies

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Q: Hey guys! I love the new album and all of your work. Off top I love how you think the chords in "Recycling" are gunna go a certain way but it instead goes in this descending chord change thing.
Question for Noah, Dave, and Brian. What makes you guys laugh? Like genuine burst out loud laugh. Thank you

A: hey thanks for the question and glad you like the new stuff...garth marenghis dark place made us all laugh...i like delocated...party down... arrested development...eastbound and down...office space

On surfing

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Q: my question for you is do any of you surf?

A: No none of us surf, but we wish we could. We got into surf culture a little bit on our first tour with Black Dice in 2001. They had a fried from RISD days who lived in LA and was a big surfer. He may have even worked for Quiksilver at the time. We crashed at his house when we were in town for a show at the Smell. I think we had a day off too and just spent the afternoon at his house listening to records. He got us stoned and put on Crystal Voyager, which is an old surf film by George Greenough. The back half of it is all wave footage set to Pink Floyd's Echoes. It was amazing! And while learning to surf is a goal of mine that's hard to accomplish living in DC, I've spent a lot of time since collecting copies of classic surf films and their soundtracks. Pacific Vibrations, Morning of the Earth, Sea of Joy, Innermost Limits of Pure Fun, etc. Many years later, I brought all the DVDs with me to Oxford and Athens while were tracking and mixing MPP. Not sure why but the vibe of that record seemed to fit with watching those films in our down time. But until one of us stands up on a board for more than a second (as long as I made it up the one time I tried), we're full posers. I feel like I get a little bit of a pass for diving, but not really.

Avey on music knowledge

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Q: You guys have what seems like encyclopedic music knowledge. Your samples pull from a huge array of different kinds of music. How do you all find and keep up with so much music? There are only 24 hours of music that you can listen to in a day

A: I enjoy so many different kinds of music and I'm always buying records. We love music. I think we started devoting a lot of time to it when we were really young so we've collected a lot of knowledge over a long period of time.
Avey

On Automine, Come Winter (older band incarnations)

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Q: Did Automine or another old band of yours ever play at the Red Room in Waverly? Inside Normal's Books & Records?

A: Yes! Not Auto Mine though. Auto Mine mainly played house shows, though we did one at Park School, and then one at the Catonsville Church. But Dave and I had a band called Come Winter, which occasionally drafted in Josh or Noah, and we did 3 shows at the Red Room. It was a summer tradition in between years at college when we'd either all be back in Bmore, or we'd drive down from NYC if some of us were there. So we did them in 98, 99, and 00. They were some of my favorite live performances I've ever been a part of.

Avey's favorite folk/psychedelic album

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Q: Hey guys, big fan for many years! Two questions for anyone, What's your favorite folk album? What's your favorite psychedelic album?

A: The hangmans beautiful daughter by the incredible string band is one that hits both those feelings nicely
Avey

Headspaces while recording

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Q: The new album reminds me of an airy call back to MPP. We're you guys in the same headspace while recording Painting With? Are you guys just generally happy folks making happy music or am I missing the message entirely?

A: It's been different for every record. I'd say we were all very happy while making this record. I don't think it was similar to the mpp experience just because of the times and place but that was a very easy going experience as well.

Panda on Principe Real's meaning

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Q: Noah, could you offer some background on the song Principe Real? I'm really curious, and I get a lot of meaning from it regarding family and temptation. Is that really far off? I really think that song is something special on the PBVSGR demos.

A: hey thanks for the question....the song is about the part of us that tempers our impulses so i liked the image of a sheepdog guiding the herd. temptation is a theme for the record most definitely.

PWs themes of change

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Q: Hi! I wanted to thank you guys for making some awesome music. It has been the soundtrack for a lot of special moments in my life. In particular a wanted to thank Panda Bear for PBVSGR. I checked myself into rehab for drug/alcohol addiction this past summer. It was a very tumultuous period in my life. I had to make some pretty drastic changes. There were major shifts in my relationships, location, thinking, mood, emotions, perspective, etc. I connected to each song in a unique way, particularly the lyrics of the song. But the music, the sounds is what helped keep sane. Not sure what you were going for with the album, but I took from it a theme of change and all that comes with it. It meant a lot to me, so thank you. And thank you all for the tunes you make! I guess if I had a question for you all, it would be what is your favorite cartoon, film or show?

A: glad the music helped you but really most glad to hear you're doing better. "change and all that comes with it" sums up the album pretty well id say. favorite cartoon film or show is tough!

[Setlist spoiler] Reflecting on past mixing choices

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Q: Hi everyone! Big fan, thanks for stopping by. Do you guys ever go back to your older music from the beginning of your career? If so, what do you think of your earlier work (for example, Panda with his self-titled record)?

A: I think it's interesting just to hear sonic choices. For example since we just started playing Alvin row again while we were practicing Brian asked me why I mixed the vocals in one part of the song all to one side and I had wondered the same thing haha. Though I know I did it because I was trying to make space in that chaos, you hear things years later and it sounds so different. I was driving my sisters car not long ago and flesh canoe came on her CD player and I was like...."what the..!!?" I don't really have any regrets though. To me it all specifically represents that time and place and that's what I enjoy about it.
-avey.

Weird music of the 90s

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Q: Hey guys. You are my favorite band of all time. Loved Painting With a ton. Do you still listen to bands like Pavement, TFUL282, Sun City Girls, and CAN? What else would you recommend? (Love Hiatus Kaiyote-Tawk Tomahwk Avey!) Also do you think you'll ever go back to lengthier songs with stretchy intros and fade-outs? Not to recreate any old sounds or anything, just a little more space.
(Panda do you remember me freaking out after your show in Madison at the Majestic for the PBvsGR tour?) I love you so much! That was the best time of my life, so glad I waited!

A: Yes, I (geo) still listen to all of those bands, but not as regularly as when I was younger and discovering them. In the mid 90's, I probably listened to each of those bands multiple times each week. Maybe now a handful of times each year. The 90's seem pretty popular right now in terms of current bands sounding like 90's bands, but it's usually the guitar indie rock side of things. I kind of want to push the weird 90's out there a little more. I've been talking to a friend about doing a weird 90's mix for his radio show. If you want to go back to that time, track down old copies of Bananafish magazine. Climax Golden Twins were really important to us. A lot of the Drag City catalog was cool. Silver Jews were massively important. Doesn't get mentioned very often but Dave and I were big Palace (Will Oldham) fans in high school. Also all four of us loved Stereolab. I'm alone on this I think, but I hear some Stereolab influence on Painting With. Halo Benders were pretty sweet too. Sometimes when people talk about how Dave and Noah sing together in AC it makes me think of how Calvin and Doug did it in the Halo Benders.

On Ratking

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Q: Hey, not sure if you guys are still answering questions but I'll give it a shot. I saw you guys on Tuesday and it was absolutely amazing. I also loved Ratking, and my question is how did you come to work with them? I know theyve listed you as an influence, so did you hear that and reach out to them or the other way around? Thanks for the ama and the crazy show!

A: hey thanks for the question and this is noah....we have a bunch of mutual friends around new york...first id heard of them was through eric copeland because he'd made a track with them...i met eric from ratking a little bit after that...theyre the best

Panda on knitting factory

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Q: Hey Noah, is there any chance you could tell us where this show took place ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOHZGglVtSI

A: hey pretty sure thats knitting factory in manhattan...i only played young prayer there...at north 6th in brooklyn and at bard college (w dave)

On Vancouver

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Q: what are your opinions on vancouver, bc? or bc in general, i guess

A: i love vancouver...weve had good shows there...out to mood hut crew and frog eyes

Avey on their album art (in depth)

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Q: Since I can connect a lot to the visual aspect of the band's music, I'd like to ask about that strand of the band's creative output. Are the visuals mostly created by the band, or do you get help with the process from other people? What's that process like?
Also, what is your favorite album cover from your own catalog?

A: Most of the album art is created by me except the campfire songs cover and back which Noah did and inside which my sister Abby did. The photos on hcti are photos of the band which I then drew over. And the cover of sung tongs which my sister did as well and Chz which was done by Abby and our friend rob. All of the painting with art was made by Brian degraw. And the mpp material was collected by the whole band.
My good friend rob Carmichael has helped me put all the art together and make sense of it all in album terms. He fully helped me realize the idea for the crackbox cover which is one of my favorites and he's been pretty essential in putting all the pieces together so to speak.
My sister has done all the production work for our current tour and Chz. Tours. She has done most of our shirts over the years.
Often we just have ideas that we want realized or the visuals come from conversations the band has had. Since I enjoy making visual stuff it's usually relaxing for me to be able to work on the covers and additional artwork. But if I'm too busy with music or just not inspired or we are looking for something I can't do then we are lucky to know so many sweet artists.

Panda's drum kit for CHz

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Q: I've got a simple question for Noah; what made you decide to use that type of drum set on Chz? When I first saw your guy's performances I was never expecting to see something so different.
Thanks

A: hey thanks for the question...i wanted something kind of clunky and wooden and i knew i didn't want a traditional setup...id heard a bunch of cool cumbia stuff and liked the sound of the congas and shakers so i tried to put a system together that might make those types of sounds

Dave on working with Abby

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Q: Hey guys, I really love the new album and had an amazing time at the first show in Philly! I have a separate question for each of you:
Dave: Is it important for you to have you sister contribute creatively to Animal Collective? Btw I think the set design and visuals for this tour are incredible.


A: Abby and I have collaborated on art projects since we were kids so it just feels natural.
-AVEY

On Delay's reference to Camden

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Q: Is the Camden you reference in "On Delay" the one in the UK or Camden, NJ?

A: hey its a reference to camden yards which is a baseball stadium in baltimore

On music criticism (in depth)

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Q: Hey guys, huge music nerd and huge fan right here. I think you guys should always be considered for most creative and influential bands of the 2000s. Not just influence like Nirvana spreading grunge, but almost more influence for just spreading creativity. Like, really, thank you guys for letting the world see all the crazy things going on in your collective minds. It's been a wonderful and insightful ride.
With that being said, how do you guys feel about the criticism with your last two albums? You'd have to be aware that it's a general consensus that post Merriweather hasn't been received quite as well as everything else you guys had going on. Pitchfork even, the team that adored you all the most it seemed, has not given praise to the last two pieces.
Sorry if this comes off as rude or anything, it would just mean a lot to me for an answer on this. Bands never seem to want to comment on their shortcomings and you know, I'm sure you guys will have a million other fun and easy questions in here.
Thanks in advance for an answer or comment and have a great day. Thanks for the AMA.

A: Hi, it's Geo. There are a lot of emotions when you put out a record. First and foremost we have to be psyched on it, and usually that can carry you through any negative reviews. I think it helps that we put out a lot of stuff before we really became popular. I once saw a great quote by Jack White that said something to the effect of it's healthy to make music for a long time and have no one give a shit, because it forces you to realize why you give a shit and want to continue making it. I've carried that with me for a long time, and I think we achieved that level a long time ago. That being said, we're always proud of what we put out into the world, and usually feel like it ranks up there with all our other work, so it can be jarring when people seem to hear it completely different than we do. It can trigger some immature emotions, but they don't overtake us. Have you seen End of the Tour yet? It's really good. The conversation they have in the Mall of America about critical/commercial success is a good one. We are always able to stay level headed about it. I had a teacher in high school that used to have really strict rules about arguing with other students in class. He allowed it as long as you attacked the person's idea, and never the person. No ad hominem as he would say. So when I see a negative review it can be tempting to attribute it to something personal about the reviewer, like I can imagine their record collection sucks and we just come from different places, but that's unhealthy for all. And in times of click bait, I think it adds to the meanness, but I always imagine if I sat down for a drink with the most vicious people, it'd be cool. At the end of the day we all like music and are on the same team.

Danny Perez' Antibirth

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Q: Have you seen Danny Perez's new film Antibirth? If so what do you think?

A: haven't seen it yet but really looking forward to it

Favorite film scores

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A: The hired hand. The shining. Morning of the earth. Pee Wees big adventure.
I'd love to do a film score. Probably for horror. The soundtrack to the movie The witch is pretty sweet.

Favorite Pavement songs

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A: Greenlander, So Stark You're a Skyscraper, Perfume V, Stop Breathing, all of Watery Domestic, Motion Suggests, Grounded, live versions of Fight This Generation from 1994, could go on and on!

[jetski]

Thanks for compiling those Fovrodi, awesome stuff. I really love this v thoughtful answer Geo gave about music criticism and negative reviews

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There are a lot of emotions when you put out a record. First and foremost we have to be psyched on it, and usually that can carry you through any negative reviews. I think it helps that we put out a lot of stuff before we really became popular. I once saw a great quote by Jack White that said something to the effect of it's healthy to make music for a long time and have no one give a shit, because it forces you to realize why you give a shit and want to continue making it. I've carried that with me for a long time, and I think we achieved that level a long time ago. That being said, we're always proud of what we put out into the world, and usually feel like it ranks up there with all our other work, so it can be jarring when people seem to hear it completely different than we do. It can trigger some immature emotions, but they don't overtake us. Have you seen End of the Tour yet? It's really good. The conversation they have in the Mall of America about critical/commercial success is a good one. We are always able to stay level headed about it. I had a teacher in high school that used to have really strict rules about arguing with other students in class. He allowed it as long as you attacked the person's idea, and never the person. No ad hominem as he would say. So when I see a negative review it can be tempting to attribute it to something personal about the reviewer, like I can imagine their record collection sucks and we just come from different places, but that's unhealthy for all. And in times of click bait, I think it adds to the meanness, but I always imagine if I sat down for a drink with the most vicious people, it'd be cool. At the end of the day we all like music and are on the same team.

https://www.reddit.com/r/indieheads/com ... ma/d0dvlog

[Curved Hair]

Very impressive AMA compilation- thank you fov

[anthro]

yes! thanks fov

[poop]

Thanks a lot Fov, much easier to read than Reddit.

[Fovrodi]

Avey Slasher Flicks AMA

Avey on levitating and revisiting older musical styles

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Q: Thank you for opening many doors for so many of us people. Have you ever levitated, Sponge Luke style?
If a different question is preferred: Will we ever see you return to a slower paced/minimal and intimate style of music composition, or are we going to be in an ever increasing multi-layered multi-dimensional soundscape, matching our increased global pace of networking and information overload? I still greatly adore the sounds you and the friends create either way.
Thanks for existing, Daev!

A: levitated ...not physically
i'm open to exploring all kinds of sounds in the future so expect anything

Future plans for Slasher Flicks, and playing old stuff

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Q: hey avey!!! 1. will slasher flicks continue their project in the future? 2. do you think animal collective will ever touch up on an older era again, like what you guys did with fireworks/essplode? 3. whats the last thing you listened to?

A: slasher flicks has a good time so it's possible. not something we've discussed though
It's hard to say where AC is at this point with older stuff. It might be nice to head into a world of unknown material for awhile. But the old stuff will come back some day for sure.

Avey on what music he's digging, encounters with fans, mail from fans, and karaoke

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Q: Hey Avey, Thank you for everything you do. I’m always amazed by your creativity, and your work is a huge inspiration for me! AC has definitely been a gateway band for me. I had so much fun seeing you play 3 times last year, and will be seeing Slasher Flicks in Philly. But I have a few questions:
What music are you really digging right now?
What was the strangest encounter you’ve had with a fan? Any weird fan mail or gifts? Or do you just throw fan mail out of the back of your tour bus on the highway?
What’s your favorite song to sing karaoke to? (If you only want to answer one of these, please let it be this one)
Thanks!

A: I dig persian folk music these days. Burial. King Krule. Black Dice. Hiatus Kiayote.
nothing that strange actually. I always read fan mail.
Not really a karaoke kinda person actually.

Avey on what he'd do if he didn't make music

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Q: Hi Avey, huge fan of your work, words can't express. If you were to choose a career outside of music, what would you be?

A: I'd like to make a horror film though I'm not really sure i could make a "career" out of it

Avey on Slasher merch, top 3 horror films, staying inspired, the #1 artist (dead or alive) he would work with

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Q: hey dave, i’m a massive fan of yours and all of your projects, and i’m so glad you’re doing an ama.
these are my questions:
is there merch for the slasher flicks tour? also, can you give us a little bit of what to expect from the tour? [s]you’re performing at a lot of small venues, so will it be a lot more stripped down in terms of stage effects?[/s]
we all know enter the slasher house is inspired by scary flicks. if you had to give us your top 3 horror movies, what would they be?
how do you keep yourself inspired after making constant albums, eps, collaborations, and so forth, for over 15 years? do you think it’s easier to write from personal experience, or from an outside perspective?
completely cliche question, but if you could collaborate with one other artist (dead or alive), who would you pick?
thanks dave, you’re the best!

A: Yeah we will have a new tshirt. There will be some visuals.
Exorcist. The Shining. Possession.
i think just being open to the moment and still excited to make sounds.
hard one. J Dilla perhaps

Down there gear, what Avey's been listening to, and a book he'd read recently

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Q: Hey dude, they’re quick, I have a few, please consider them. On Down There how extensively did you use the monomachine? On the pre-release Centipede tour at a show you recommended me Black Woman by Sonny Sharrok. What have you been listening to lately? I read The Untameables and loved it. Have you been reading recently? What else would you recommend? Thanks for doing this.

A: Down There was made mostly with the MonoMachine.
Alot of Jazz
Speedboat by Renata Adler

Avey on reviews, AC hiatus, and playing old songs live

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Q: Sup Avey!
Do you read reviews of albums you've worked on?
Is there a new Animal Collective album in the works?
Why doesn't Animal Collective play their earlier stuff, especially stuff from Spirit They're Gone (I love that album), live anymore?
I think that's it...
I really enjoyed Enter the Slasher House, the first three tracks are probably my favorites so far.
Uhhhm yeah thanks for doing this AMA ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

A: No i try not to read reviews.
No album in the works right now. Some songs here and there.
Theres so much to choose from it's hard. Some of the stuff is so old it's hard to connect to it as well. Kind of a weird feeling. Even stuff on feels can be hard for me to bring back. all kinds of different emotions. It also has to fit into the current sounds too which can be tricky.

Avey on Miami and listening to AC side-projects

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Q: Hey, Avey. Just wanted to say you're one of the top influences and inspirations in my life. Your music has moved me in so many ways so i sincerely thank you for that.
Just a handful of questions:
What are your thoughts on Miami? Any chance of seeing slasher flicks or animal collective down here anytime soon? Miami needs love too .
Do you ever listen to your fellow band mates solo stuff for fun?
I appreciate you doing this AMA, much love and respect. Thank you.

A:I love miami. Wish we could play there more. Love those Everglades. Probably not gonna get there soon though. We will try.
Yes indeed.

Avey on Derek

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Was Derek from Strawberry Jam a real dog? And if so who owned him?
I wish you well in every project you work on, be it AnCo or Slasher Flicks.
Sincerely,
A total fanboy

A: Yes. He was noah's Family Dog. Noah wrote that jam.

Avey on ranking his own music

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Q: I think centipede hz is the most underrated album, I think its brilliant. Can you rate Animal Collective albums in order of preference?

A: Thanks! rating music is kind of absurd to me. Shouldn't be done. Our albums sit a part from each other to me and i find that most music has it's own special place in my life. My enjoyment of the records would be based more on my experience making and playing the music so it's hard to do.

Avey on old tour days

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Q: Hi Avey, What were the first Animal Collective shows like before you had a widespread fanbase? Any memorable moments from the early days?

A: The whole experience of our early tours is very memorable. It's something that can't really be re created for better or worse. I still enjoy touring but it's different. As far as the actual shows we basically just didn't really know what we were doing hehe. i remember falling asleep in the van in a drunken daze in florida on the sung tongs tour. We played foosball and drank all day at the bar. I woke up right before noah and i were supposed to play and walked right onto the stage and played. fun times.

Avey responds to a troll

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Q: Dear Avey, what the fuck are adobe slabs ?

A: I have no idea what that guy is talking about hehe

Avey on future solo plans

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Q: AC and associated side projects have been a huge inspiration for me and my band Food Group, just wanted to say thanks for everything.
any plans for more solo stuff in the future? "Down There" is my most listened to album of all time.

A: Thanks A lot! ya i'm really into recording stuff at home these days. Can't really say what will happen cause I'm also into not playing music so much all the time. Breaks are nice. but i will be making more.

Avey on influences/themes behind Slasher Flicks

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Q: Hey Avey, just want to say Animal Collective has really helped me grow into the person I am today, and the new Slasher Flicks record is beyond groovy! I feel like like a lot of your projects and pieces deal with an acceptance of darkness or dark themes, and I was wondering what in particular has influenced your writing as of late?

A: being Sick last year influenced me a lot. The way the mind and The body work together. But also anything that's happening around me can be an influence.

WCWAR and Leaf House samples/field recordings

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Q: Huge fan of everything you've done. Animal Collective is me and my friends main reason why we've started to collaborate and play music together, so thank you for your inspiration.
What is that sound byte at the beginning of Who Could Win a Rabbit? I can't find it anywhere and it's been bugging me for a long time.

A: I made all those snippets with my field recording just walking around brooklyn then effected them later. I recorded that in a deli in crown heights. "kitties" is me walking into my sisters apt to feed her cats. Always have the field recorder handy for good sound moments.

Avey on his worst concert performance

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Q: Best/worst concert you've performed.

A: Worst was in belgium at a festival on the Feels tour. I got really drunk before we played and knocked down all my amps three songs in cause the on stage sound was terrible and i couldn't hear what was going on. I threw my PRS into the air and it cracked in half and i said goodnight. The sound guys were like "whos this guy, he's worse then axel rose". I kinda vowed never to do that kinda thing again.
one of the best things i did though was make up for that by playing a bunch of acoustic songs in the parking lot for some people after the show with josh.

Avey on bass vs. bass guitar in ACs music

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Q: Is the bass on Little Fang an electric bass or a synthesizer?

A: It's a moog voyager. The only time a bass guitar really makes an appearance in a song i've worked on is in what would i want sky.

Avey on Slasher House visuals and ODDSAC being DVD exclusive

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Q: Hi Avey, thanks for doing this.
I really dig the Enter the Slasher House "visual full album" that Abby directed, and a little sad that it's only a temporary stream. Are there any plans to give it a more permanent release, like a DVD/BD or even a paid download?
Also, any chance of ODDSAC on Blu-ray?

A: The visuals will be around but not officially released on anything.
No blu rays coming to my knowledge.

Avey summarizes every album of his in one word

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Q: If you had to summarize each of your albums with one word, what would it be? I love that you have always approached music in a new way in each phase of your career. Thanks for doing this Avey you're one of my favorite musicians!

A: Spirit - Maryland Danse - Light Hollind - tour Campfire - Floor HCTI - Confused Sung Tongs - Strum Feels - Emotion Strawberry Jam - Transition MPP - Rain Centipede HZ - Radio Down There - Swamp Slasher House - Ghost

Avey on the internet's effect on ACs career

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Q: Hey Avey, huge fan of your music as well as Animal Collective's of course. My question is: what role has the internet played in your / AC's careers? What are some of the positives and negatives? And do you think AC's widespread success would've been possible without the internet?
I mean all of these questions as someone who heard about you guys on the internet way back, and probably would have never learned about you otherwise (or at least not until a great deal later).
Thanks!

A: it's certainly helped our music reach a larger audience. I remember playing in chile and people singing along to songs before we had records out in south america. Not really sure i can say what the negative aspects are other then perhaps music is just a bit more disposable in this digital age.

"Will you ever play Alvin Row live?"

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A: hard to say. probably not anytime in the near future but maybe some day.

"Would you draw something for me that I can get tattooed on my body?"

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A: I could give it a shot!

[AudibleKayak]

Fovrodi wrote:

Avey on reviews, AC hiatus, and playing old songs live

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Q: Sup Avey!
Do you read reviews of albums you've worked on?
Is there a new Animal Collective album in the works?
Why doesn't Animal Collective play their earlier stuff, especially stuff from Spirit They're Gone (I love that album), live anymore?
I think that's it...
I really enjoyed Enter the Slasher House, the first three tracks are probably my favorites so far.
Uhhhm yeah thanks for doing this AMA ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

A: No i try not to read reviews.
No album in the works right now. Some songs here and there.
Theres so much to choose from it's hard. Some of the stuff is so old it's hard to connect to it as well. Kind of a weird feeling. Even stuff on feels can be hard for me to bring back. all kinds of different emotions. It also has to fit into the current sounds too which can be tricky.

Oh wow, those are my questions! Kinda weird seeing that... man was a stupid back then...

[Fovrodi]

Hehe, it's not that bad really. It's natural

[Fovrodi]

poop wrote:

Thanks a lot Fov, much easier to read than Reddit.

You're welcome poop

[Fovrodi]

Good eye thanks I'll change it

[kafkaesque]

Fovrodi wrote:

"Will you ever play Alvin Row live?"

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A: hard to say. probably not anytime in the near future but maybe some day.

hahahaa nice

[VanishingCactus]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpGV2PkRJVY

[Fovrodi]

Abby

wrote:

Who would you say are your biggest inspirations in terms of visual art? How much does AC's music influence your art or art style?

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Hello ! hmmm so many things influence my art. I think its hard for AC to not influence my art most of the time since , i have worked for them for so long. I like to look at a lot of children books from the 60's and 70's big influence to me. Also early Disney and Mary Blaire.

wrote:

What can we expect from this performance regarding visuals? Are you preparing a stage installation or is it going to be more focused on stage mapping (be sure I’m going to love any of them, I’m just very curious!)? Is this going to be a unique performance for CPH:DOX or will people be able to see it somewhere else in the near future?

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Hi oh thats awesome you will be there. We are still actually working out the visual parts of this show. I think because its a film festival it will be heavy on the video and mapping side, but could have some other elements. Right now this is a one off for dave and I , who knows in the future !

wrote:

What has been your favorite thing that you've created for Animal Collective, and why?
What is your favorite Animal Collective release, and why?
I've recently started painting and made this (https://i.redd.it/h66ohiilwc9y.jpg) with some AC lyrics. It's not really a question but I wanted to show it to you/wonder if you might be able to pass it along
Thanks!

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HI! thanks for the questions. hmmm my favorite things i have made for AC ...I love the sung tongs record cover i think because its one of the first things i worked on. I still have a sort of nostalgia for it. Also we did an ocean set design for prospect park years back. That was the first large design i worked on and love the theme and style of it still
oh awesome thanks ill check out your paintings for sure !
oh favorite release hmmm i have some favorite songs ? Safer , in the flowers , crimson , number 1 , apple sauce ?

wrote:

What is your favorite memory of time spent with the band?

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hmmm thats a tough one ! There are so many to be honest . I love touring with them and the rest of our crew and some of our days off are really sweet memories. This year we went on an airboat ride in florida , it was just a sweet break we all needed. I think also we went to Tivoli in Copenhagen , a few years ago its an old amusement park. We all went as a large group one evening and was super fun. There are so many though!!

wrote:

From where do you draw the majority of your inspiration for the album/live art?
Which AnCo album is your favorite?

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It really depends on the album they are working on. This one since it was called painting with, I looked at a lot of art history , dada, and different forms of art and sculpture to do the set design and there press photos. But it always changes with whatever they are working on. I don't think i have a favorite , but I do like fall be kind a lot

wrote:

What is your personal favourite piece of work you've made?

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hmm I don't know if a have a favorite really. I love being on tour and doing live visuals and constantly changing and working on the set that we have at the time so it evolves . I think how things start as drawings and then grow is really exciting for me

wrote:

Hey Abby, what is your favorite thing about living in LA? Your favorite candy? and do you listen to music while making art, if so, does it help the process? thanks!

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hi ! I love the outdoor part of LA. I love the fact you can go to the beach and see the snow in the same day. My favorite candy would be most gummy candy. I love being in Europe and getting giant bags of candy you can pick out of the bins. I really just think its pretty to be honest . I do listen to music yes , I think it helps but depends on what i working on. Some set design things are stressful and need to concentrate. But if I'm drawing for sure !

wrote:

Hi Abby, I've just signed up to Reddit because I loved the stage design and visuals for the last animal collective tour. It really helped me make sense of the album, it made the music better, and it looked amazing. Would love to know about the brief you were given at the start of the commission, what ideas you had at the time, and how the final work strayed/grew?
Sorry for the big q. xoxo

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Awesome thanks so much. I helped out with their press photos even before the stage was designed. Since this record was called painting with i wanted to reference painters of the past. I art directed the photos of them , where they look like different paintings.
I basically just continued this thought with the set design for this past year. It always changes so much times from the first drawings to the end of tour. I think it turned out exactly how i wanted , but grew the more content i made and the better i knew the songs live.

wrote:

What's your favorite animal?
As a creator/artist, what motivates you to create (the (awesome wonderful things you create)?

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I love my dog ! I think she is my favorite creature on the planet . She's so weird and goofy like a cartoon . I also love horses and grew up riding. I think I really just love making stuff. I think animals , disney , being outside. I love old amusement parks and find them very inspiring , also Jim Henson

wrote:

What are some of your favorite musicians/bands?

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Thank you ! I listen to such a range of stuff. I like sixties folk and country. I find it really easy to work to and have on. I love what alot of my friends are doing right now. I love Mica and what she makes. Angel Olson , I listen to a lot of sixties girl groups too

wrote:

Centipede Hz tour set up stuff was really, really awesome. That seems like it would've been a cool experience to have been working with the band on the art side for so long and see that get all set up. I dunno, anything you have to say on that, I'd be interested.
Also in my googling I saw mentions of Disney World. Do you think it was too scary for Mr Toads Wild Ride to end with going to hell?

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Hey thank you ! yea its always a fun experience no matter what tour we are on. Its always different and challenging and stressful but in the end always really fun to see it come together. I love working with those guys there super supportive of me and with what ever crazy idea i come up with to create for them.
I loved mister toads ride growing up and was not scared of it at all. But I also grew up watching things like the shining so i didn't have alot of fears of things like that.

wrote:

Good afternoon, Abby!
Oh boy, I have lots of questions:
1) When producing video, what camera do you use?
2) When cutting visuals to be used in live projections, what editor do you use (or which ones have you used if you've used multiple)?
3) What equipment do you use when performing live visuals? What is the set-up like?
4) I'm sure it varies, but roughly how long would you say it takes to produce a single episode of visuals?
5) How did you get associated with John Cale?
6) You've dabbled in many different mediums of art from video production, live visuals, painting, sculpting, etc. Which do you enjoy the most if any in particular?
7) Did you ever see yourself doing anything different with your life?
8) Ever have a traumatic technical malfunction before or during a show? How did you manage?
9) What's your most memorable experience while on tour?
10) Anything you'd like to say to an aspiring video artist?

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1. the camera really depends on what I'm working on. It can be anything from a point and shoot to a alexa or red camera. Depends on the budget and how much crew i have.
2. i use premier but also have used final cut.
3. I use mad mapper and Modual 8 for live visuals. and a lighting console for the lights. I map everything using one projector for AC but depends again on the project or the show.
4. the time it takes me really can be anything from a day to two weeks.
5. John asked me to do a video for him a couple years ago.. from that i started to do his live visuals , tour with him and make his videos.
6. I think any form of art is fun and I love to change it up so it stays interested and I continue to learn new things.
7. I knew i wanted to make art as a child in some sort of form for a living.
8. i mean for sure things can freeze and you have to restart its all part of using computers. You just have to know that it might happen at some point .
9. there are so many memorable times , i love being on tour and working with my crew and creating something for people to see.
[10.]Awesome !! good luck to you, just keep on working and learning new technology and things in the field

wrote:

Hey Abby! I was just wondering if you were planning on releasing any music under Drawlings or any other name? I really enjoyed "Wolfie's Christmas" and I would be stoked if you released some other music. Also, I've followed your instagram for a while and it's one of my favorite instagram accounts.

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Hi thanks so much, at this point i travel so much and I'm so busy i don't really have any time to make music. I would love too again in the future but right now there is just no space for it creatively in my brain!! but it was fun to do in the past.

wrote:

I just wanted to ask you, why Noah and Davey rushed to the backstage area after the show, I'm so sad, that I couldn't managed to get my vinyl signed by Noah and Davey. I hope this happens one day, but I wished they signed it too. It was sort of a dream come true for me to see you and Noah, Davey, Brian and Jeremy live. The show & the visuals were amazing! Hope to see you all one day again! x

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Awesome thanks so much , not sure where they went , but I'm sure you will see them again sometime in the future to get it signed !

wrote:

Hi! What VJ software do you use to produce your live visuals?

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hi I use Modual 8 and Mad mapper for mapping and content

wrote:

Hey Abby, cool you're doing this. I know aside from your main gig as a visual artist, you've also made music in the past. Do you think you will ever collab with Dave or any of the rest? Also, what's your favorite food

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thanks so much, At the moment I colab so much with them on visuals that I don't there ] is space in my brain to make music at the moment. But maybe again I will! I loved being in bands and touring with them in the past. I think nachos would be my favorite food.

wrote:

Just wanted to say I love your stuff. I've always loved how well the artwork for so many of the AC albums really compliment the music in a way that is so cool. Especially sung tungs.... which other AC releases did you contribute to the album artwork or any parts of the packaging?

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hi thank you, campfire songs i did the art for. fireworks I did a limited edition engraving on a record. and the insert Young Prayer I did the art for noah for the cover. Down There , I did the cover for dave i did the single this year for grip gnop I think i might be forgetting some but this is what i can think of at the moment.

wrote:

Hey!! I met you when you guys came to Indianapolis a few months ago, you gave me your bag of veggie chips, thanks for being so cool. Any way, what's a random fun moment you've had while on the road touring?

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haha amazing ! hope they were good. man there are so many to be honest. I love traveling and going to weird places. I love just kinda being tired and up in the middle of the night somewhere working . To me all that stuff is pretty fun and a unique experience .

wrote:

1 - What exactly inspired your backdrop and animations for the PW tour?
2 - Speaking about the animations, are you planning on releasing them? Maybe in the style of the Centipede Hz visual album? I can't stress this enough, the animations you've done for the tour were reeeeeally cool.
3 - Also, this is for a Centipede Hz related thing I'm doing, what was the font that you have used for the CHz cover art?

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hey ! I remember you..
The backdrop was inspired but lots of different painters and Dada. Im not sure if we are ever going to release anything from this tour , but who knows and the font is a font we created for the record cover !

wrote:

Hi Abby! Thank you so much for doing this! I just have one question - what was your initial reaction to hearing Spirit They've Gone, Spirit They've Vanished for the first time?

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Hey ! thats hard for me to say since i was around when they recorded it. I love that record its one of my favorites , but i love hearing any of the records for the first time, always rad !

wrote:

Thanks for making such a positive impact on my life. What artistic medium or style or anything that you haven't worked with yet do you want to work with on or with the most?

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Thats a good questions. I have never done any pottery , except when was a kid so i often think about doing that !

wrote:

Do you have any funny or memorable stories from being on tour?

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most of tour is pretty fun and memorable. its a interesting job not many people get to experience , which is super tiring but really fun. I love being in weird places. I loved going to japan this year and exploring .

wrote:

I wanted to ask if there's anything special planned for this little mini tour leg coming up? Should we expect a drastic change or is it just an extension of the PW tour?

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Hey, I don't really know song wise if they will add songs, but visually it will be similar ! same set design maybe some new videos

wrote:

If you could add one more sense to the visuals and sounds. what would it be and perhaps an instance of implementation?Thanks!

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good question! smell for sure !! i would love if you could have the set spray smells out , like candy or baking or flowers or even the smell of paint for this tour.

wrote:

Hello Abby I just wanna say I love Wolfie's Christmas. Is more drawlings stuff on the way? Thanks for stopping by, we love you guys

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hi thanks !! not at the moment to busy touring at the moment to work on any songs ! maybe in the future ?

wrote:

Is there a chance of any of your own music getting released in the near future? Ty so much!

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not at the moment no, to busy touring but who knows in the future thanks so much

wrote:

Hey Abby! Ofc your bro and Brian are really into their horror films, but what are some of your favourite films? Also, when you first discovered drawing as a kid, do you remember what you loved to draw the most? For me it was rabbits and whales. Hope you have a good day! And thanks for saying hi to me after the Troxy show in London, that was very cool of you!

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I think I used to draw alot of horses and my animals at the time . My cats especially. I love alot of Russian fairytales, ET , The Shining , band of outsiders , Snow white so many movies

wrote:

I saw that you posted about that school in Iceland and I wanted to know what you do over there. Also, met you and Noah after the Miami show and the concert blew my mind. Thanks!

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hey ! I teach the "visualization of noise" at an art school over there called Lunga School . Its a really fun experience

wrote:

Hi abby! What were your inspirations for the down there interview?

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Hey I think it really came from what was going on at the time in my family and life .

wrote:

Hello Abby, how long have you been working on art and design for animal collective/ solo albums?

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pretty much since they started ! I started making tour posters back in baltimore and it grew from there.

wrote:

Hey Abby, Huge fan of yours and the band. What are your thoughts on where psychedelic and artistic culture in general stand in our present world? I feel like you guys have carved out a really interesting niche that, from my point of view, is very whimsical and freeing to watch and listen to. Also, what sort of things do you do to ensure you keep that free/creative feeling going?

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Hey thanks! I think that psychedelia is still present just in a different form. Technology has made it keep going with different ways to get weirder in videos and virtual reality. I try and watch alot of movies, get outside , travel, and i draw everyday !

wrote:

What are a few groups that you like to listen to?

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hello! , im kinda all over the place with music. but i listen to a lot of 60's girl groups and country from the same era

wrote:

What inspired your cover art for Sung Tongs?
How long have you been doing art?
Do you remember the first time you saw your brother perform live?
Favorite Velvet Underground album?

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hello ! man i can't remember to be honest , its all made out of cut paper and Its i guess a brother and sister but i can't totally recall. I guess so, I mean we lived in the same house so i think i was pretty used to seeing him play instruments and piano . But I remember a few of the early performances , was sweet. I like loaded

wrote:

Any plans for future art for AnCo?

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Im sure there will be ! i don't know anything specific at the moment

wrote:

What's your favorite color? Thank you so much for all you've done! You're a good person who deserves credit!

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I love blue !! my favorite and thanks so much

wrote:

Any other visual albums planned for the boys? Also, any clue if they are going to play Fields Fest this year?

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I don't know to be honest ! Im sure there will be new things to come , just don't have any clue right now

wrote:

What's the best thing about your sweet bro davey? Thanks for everything Abby I so enjoyed the visual art in support of pw

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The fact that we can spend so much time together and work together is pretty rare for a brother and sister . I think the best thing about him is he's my brother more then the fact that i work for him , he's super supportive of me in everything I do and the best older brother

wrote:

I really liked your set that you created for the Painting With tour. What was your inspiration for creating those figures on stage behind the boys during this tour? Sorry if that was already asked.

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thanks ! I looked at a lot of Dada artist and Dada ballet and costume design to create those guys.

wrote:

Hey Abby! Love your work, and I really feel it brings the boys work to life.
I would just like to know, what would you say is one of your fondest childhood memories of you and your brother David?

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Man there are so many , but we spent alot of time outside creating worlds and playing games, often with our cousins . This is pretty much in general a fond memory for me as a child. we spent alot of time in the woods and making fake campfires things like that.

wrote:

Are you guys planning any new additions to the setup/visuals for the May tour or will it be more of the same?

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As of now it will be the same. maybe some new videos ?

wrote:

(A) what's the context behind the sung tongs cover? what inspired it?
(B) what's your favourite AnCo cover you didn't make?
thanks for stopping by, hope you're enjoying your stay. tell the boys to come back to the UK stat

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The cover is cut paper , and to be honest i can't remember the idea behind it. I think its a brother and a sister ! sung tongs would also be my favorite .

wrote:

What was your favorite tour?
What is your proudest accomplishment?
What is the future of your music projects/Drawlingz?

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Tours are so different and have ups and downs. Most AC tours are super fun and I love being apart of working with them . I think pretty much anything I have done in the past year I am pretty proud of. Just feel like I always grow as an artist and surprise myself. right now there are no plans and i have been so busy and not able to make any music. But who knows in the future.

[Fovrodi]

Avey Eucalyptus AMA

Avey on releasing song stems

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Q: Hi Avey! I was at the Brooklyn listening party and Eucalyptus sounds great. What do you think of putting out a few stems of some songs you've made over the years? All the songs you and the rest of Animal Collective have made are so layered, it would be interesting to dissect and hear individual layers.

Avey: I think that's an interesting idea for sure. I could see doing that with Eucalyptus. i sort of wanted to do that with the puzzle site but opted for a simplified version. There are so many stems sometimes that it would be hard to do with older ac stuff but maybe we would do something like that if it was composed for that purpose.

Aveys Hawaiian Music Rec

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Q: Can't say enough good about Eucalyptus. I love playing it for my newborn son.

Hawaiian music is so special to me and you've mentioned it as an influence on this record. Any particular Hawaiian musicians you can recommend?

Avey: Brother Nolan!

Aveys recommended drink pairing for Eucalyptus

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Q: Hey Avey, today is my 21st birthday. Could you recommend me a drink that I should pair with the new album?

Avey: Mezcal Neat

Aveys update on AC-related vinyl reissues

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Q: Hi Avey, I'm a big fan of you and Animal Collective. Just want you to know that I love your new album, and Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished is one of my favourite albums of all time! I'm just wondering is there any chance of some vinyl reissues of Spirit and Feels any time soon? I know you reissued them a few years back, but I'm fairly new to record collecting, and they're hard to come by!

Avey: yup we are working on it!

Avey on producing sounds on STGSTV and potential doc of their early years

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Q: Hey Dave, I have a couple questions, feel free to answer whatever you like

I've always been curious as to how you achieved the harsh sounds on the Spirit album - specifically on the Untitled track. They have a nice quality that I've found hard to achieve with feedback loops or whatever.

Is the documentary about AC's early touring years still being worked on / happening or has the project been abandoned?

[s]Are you guys still planning a live archive similar to Fugazi's[/s]?

Avey: I own this magical sequential circuits delay unit that i have had since early college. It's partly broken now unfortunately so i don't use it as much but we used to use it a lot. I used that with a couple digital reverb units to make those sounds via feedback loops.

It's never really been in the works. i have so much footage. I used to video everything. I'd love to do something with it at some point but i just have to find the right time

Avey on the opening line to Kinda Bonkers and preferred breakfast foods

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Q: Hey Avey! First of all, I want to say thank you for all the incredible music you have made, especially your new album which is fantastic.

Anyways, I have a couple questions: In your lyrics you always bring up food like in your songs like Bagels in Kiev or in Kinda Bonkers with "life is pretty french toast to me, if you wait too long it gets black and weak". I also find myself asking friends "what you doing, how's your food?" . So, I love the line from Kinda Bonkers so much but I've always wondered how you came up with it or what led you to it? Also, as a large proponent of breakfast food, I have to ask: french toast, waffles or pancakes?

Avey: I'm not sure how i got to that line. I was actually going to change it in the studio then i heard brian say "I don't know what that means but i like that line a lot". so i kept it.

French Toast. Pancakes always seem like a good idea but i can never eat that many. I'm more of an eggs and greens kinda person in terms of breakfast

Avey on going in the acoustic direction

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Q: Hey Avey! Not sure if you remember me, but my friend and I ran into you by coincidence behind Emo's before your peformance in Austin after the whole Levitation fiasco last year haha

Coming off of the manic Centipede Hz and hustle-bustle of Painting With, it seems the Collective is slamming on the breaks with releases like Meeting of the Waters and Eucalyptus. How does it feel returning to a stripped down and more laid back vibe? Would you say you are enjoying the direction so far?

I'd also like to add that I absolutely love Eucalyptus, it's a great album for sitting on the patio on a summer morning. I look forward to more listens!

Avey: It's hard to put a timeline on it cause i was sort of working in this direction before we started working on painting with. I don't really think any of the other ac guys are really focusing on acoustic stuff as much as i am. For me it was just nice to work in this realm outside of working with all the electronics that The group has been using. Thanks!

Avey on fans sharing their music with him

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Q: Hey Avey~

I gave u that weird drawing of a hand with the rain patterns at the Big Sur camping wknd. I had wanted to give u one of my albums as well- I’ve always wanted to share my music w/ you, but I didn’t wanna be selfish & make our interaction about me.

I was wondering how you feel about fans giving u their records? If your into it, what’s the best way- CD, Usb stick, URL, etc?

Avey: I'm into it. It's awesome to hear what people are doing out there and a good way to discover music. Any way works!

Avey on future releases like Live at 9:30 Club

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Q: Plans for more live releases like the 9:30, perhaps of older shows as well?

And what would I do if you wasn't around?

Avey: Definitely. I'd like to put out shows from older times.

Avey on problems in the music industry, musical styles, HCTI, no favorites, and Abby

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Q: Hey Avey! Quite a fan (as you can see by the flair!) I've got a lot of good ones for you!

Are there a lot of problems in the independent music scene a lot of regular listeners might not know about?

This year you've released two rather soft spoken relatively acoustic records, one under the Animal Collective with Geologist and, of course, your most recent solo work. We haven't seen this sort of music from you since 2007 with Pullhair Rubeye. Should we be eager to hear more of this sound from here on?

Here Comes The Indian was a really strange endevour for you guys, apparently. Reading through a Pitchfork interview back when Centipede Hz was released, you said it was a lot more improv based. Was this the only album you've done like this? Or have there been other records that had the 'winging it' moments?

What is your favourite album you've made, weather a solo or side project or something with Animal Collective?

Abby recently did an AMA on the /r/AnimalCollective subreddit. Has she had a lot of influence on your music?

Avey: hey sorry for the delay here.

hmm not sure what kind of problems you mean.
Hard to say where i am going next. I doubt the next ac record will be an acoustic endeavor if thats what you're getting at. But again it's hard to say. i've been writing more songs on the acoustic actually that perhaps ill play on tour but i've also been playing more electric guitar so that's really where i am at
The music thats on hollindagain has that feeling but we never made it into the studio for that. Some of the songs on HCTI are composed by me like slippi and Native Belle and parts of hey light. but a lot of the moments were left very open.
I don't really have favorites of anything
Her creativity and drive is inspiring for sure

Avey on the possibility of another visual album

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Q: One of my favorite things you have put together is ODDSAC, I am way over 60+ views on it and I always keep finding new things in it. I am not sure if this has been asked before but is there any plans in the future to make another Visual Album with Danny Perez along the same lines of ODDSAC?

Avey: We talk here and there with Danny about that sort of thing and i love his work so it would be interesting and fun. But it's just hard having the time and ideas to do that. Oddsac took a very long time to put together

Avey on songwriting influences

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Q: hey avey! loving eucalyptus. one thing i've always admired about your work is your lyricism; do you have any particular influences when it comes to your songwriting? i've always gotten some strong william carlos williams vibes from some of your work with ac.

Avey: My writing style is actually influenced more by fiction or short stories than it is poetry though i like some poetry here and there. Nabokov and Robert Walser were very big influences on me.

Avey on his favorite animals

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Q: Avey!! What are a few of your favorite animals? <3

Avey: Crocodilians of all sorts. Otters. Wasps.

Avey on solo vs. band efforts, writers block, and his favorite Eucalyptus track

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Q: Hello, Avey! Thank you for doing this AMA as we are huge fans of your work. I thought Eucalyptus was wonderful. My questions are:

How does working on a solo album compare to working with a group, like Animal Collective or Slasher Flicks?

What do you do when you are stuck writing a song or hit a creative wall?

What is your favorite track from Eucalyptus?

Thanks again!

Avey: It definitely takes more time to do a solo record because i have to come up with all the parts and production etc. It can be more frustrating but it feels really good to push through it and reach the goal. On the other hand while working with a group you have to be really open and receptive to other peoples ideas and trust that they are the best for the songs or records. So that can be just as difficult. I feel lucky that i have such an easy musical relationship with the people i play with the most.

Usually i just stop doing it. i try and play music or make something every day. I'm actually a workaholic. But i've finally learned after all these years that you can't force something that isn't there and thats truth for many scenarios. If i start getting frustrated i just move onto something else that day.

I don't really have a favorite but i would put PJ up there because it's one of the most stripped down songs I've ever recorded and been satisfied with.

Avey on psychedelic music and yelling/screaming in music

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Q: Hey there, thank you so much for doing this AMA! Loving your new album! I've always wanted to know, what or who influenced you to begin making psychedelic music, especially in the early years of Animal Collective? And what influenced your unique style of screaming and singing on the Strawberry Jam album?

You are my biggest inspiration as a musician, thank you so much!

Avey: I think I was drawn to confusion in music and music that sort of became something more than it was at an early age. It's really hard to define what psychedelic music really is cause i feel like some people think it's something completely different than i do. And some people i know think that term is vague and doesn't mean anything. But i also experimented a lot with LSD when i was young and that definitely opened me up to it.

i always liked singers who expressed themselves with louder almost screaming but melodic vocals. John Lennon, Lots of old Soul Singers or like the Four Tops (listen to Bernadette) or Kurt Cobain. It also just started being something i had to do to compete with the volume and energy of our playing.
thanks!

Avey on Selection of a Place's development

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Q: Heya Avey!

With the new take on “Selection of a Place” on Eucalyptus, I'm curious: what was the development of this song from writing to Meeting of the Waters to this album like? How did you know it was something you'd wanna include on this release too?

(Excited to catch the opening show of the US tour at Boston too!)

Avey: The song was already written when we went down to Brazil though i changed some of the guitar parts when i actually recorded it. MOTW actually re inspired me to keep playing these songs and record them because at that point i wasn't really sure if i was going to keep them around. It felt really good to play that music down there though. I didn't want to have to take a bunch of stuff down to brazil with me so i figured my best contribution would be some acoustic songs. But i always knew it would be a part of this release i just wanted to make sure we had enough cool tunes for meeting of the waters so i decided to take it there too.

Avey on the fate of "Song for Jerome"

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Q: Avey, thanks so much for doing this AMA. I'm in love with the new album and frankly everything you've done. Can you finally solve the mystery of "Song for Jerome" for me? Can you either provide the lyrics or a better quality audio version of it? It's one of my favorite compositions by you and I've always been stuck listening to a low quality youtube concert version of it.

Avey: I have a demo live version of that song and the others i did on that tour which sounds pretty good. i've been wanting to get it out there in some form it's just never been a priority. But maybe sometime soon ill let it see the light of day.

Avey on his songwriting process

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Q: Hey Avey! I'm a huge animal collective enthusiast (about to see you guys for the 5th time on saturday) as well as an aspiring musician. I would love to hear some insight into your songwriting process and how it might have changed since you first started writing music.

Avey: I feel like it changes in terms of the instrument I'm using and that often will dictate the songs i write. For example i wrote all my songs for painting with on a synth and all my songs for Eucalyptus on an acoustic guitar. I feel like approaching an instrument with a fresh feeling is really important to me. I have been gravitating back to guitar a lot lately though.

Avey on revisiting/reworking old songs

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Q: sweet avey- Over the years I've noticed there's a general consensus between fans that much of your music evokes a nostalgic sort of feeling. I suspect it has to do with some of the themes of childhood that you've dealt with in the past. I was just wondering, do you feel nostalgic listening to records like Spirit They're Gone? Does it sort of bring you back to that time in your life and make you reminisce about the early days of animal collective? Was it easy to put yourself back in that sort of mind state to rework Alvin Row for this past tour?(which was amazing btw.) Also does listening to, say, STGSTV, bring up any specific memories or glimpses into your life at that time? I'd be interested to hear:-) thank you for everything you've done.

Avey: Last question of the day!

I definitely get taken right back to touring those songs or recurring them. I recently had to listen to sung tongs to approve a new pressing of it and went right back to colorado where we recorded it.

Usually reworking songs has more to do with making them feel current than it does feeling the past in them. Though sometimes because of the emotions involved it can be hard to sing or play them. And that's also a reason why we might not play them.

Someday was a really hard song for noah and i to get on spirit and so at one point we went outside and my parents had all these trees in front of their house and we started throwing pine cones and rocks at trees for awhile cause we were so frustrated that we couldn't record that song. i think that worked cause we went back in and got it.

Avey on his upcoming tour

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Q: hey Avey, thanks for joining us on here again! i'm loving the gorgeous, natural feel of Eucalyptus and can't wait to catch you live this fall what is something you're looking forward to on your upcoming solo tour?

Avey: I've been really into just getting out there and playing for people in the last year and a half. We've been having lots of fun on the AC tours and so I'm grateful that i can keep it going and play more for people. Its a good feeling.

Avey on his live setup for the painting with tour

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Q: Can you tell me a bit about your current tour set up? Without revealing too much about your sound, what are you looking at when performing?

Avey: I'm looking at an octatrack. an esq 1 synth. Two space echo pedals, a waldorf synth box and two mixers. I also have two vocoders on stage and two critter and guitari loopers that i use.

Avey on the inspiration behind Eucalyptus' album cover

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Q: The new album art is awesome, was it inspired by anything?

Avey: old nonsuch classical and explorer series covers.

Avey on leaf house, house of leaves, and nicknames

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Q: hi dave! eucalyptus is fantastic, congrats! thanks for coming here and doing the ama, we're all happy to have you here! your music has changed my life and inspired me to create my own music, which i am eternally grateful for. the life experiences i've had listening to things like sung tongs and strawberry jam are incredible and i will never forget them. i just have a few questions for ya if that's alright!

1: was "leaf house" based on the novel "house of leaves?" that's my favorite book, so it would be cool to know what you thought of it. there's lots of similarities between the song and book! 2: what is the meaning behind the name "doon" during the campfire songs era? 3: will we ever know the story behind this magical picture?? https://i.imgur.com/5OA1hAo.png

thanks for your time, I'll see you in Austin this October!

Avey: Thanks that means a lot!

No leaf house was a reference to the house noah grew up in. I believe it touches on the feelings of Noahs father passing and no longer being around. I read that book not long ago. It's great.

We have tons of nick names for each other. Doon is one of many. Our group of friends in college and in the first apt we lived in together had all these nick names for each other. Someone gave me Doon. not sure why ha.

Avey on writers block and dealing with it

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Q:
---QUESTION: What do you do to combat creative blocks or lulls where you feel too depressed or uninspired to work? For someone as prolific as you, it's hard to believe you encounter them at all, but I know that must be untrue. Bonus round: what DAW do you use?---

Avey: I do get them indeed! Just best to step away and clear your head. I find it's only fun if it feels natural and new and the inspiration can just pour out.

Avey on releasing the album without singles, meditation, religion, and performing

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Q: Hello Avey!! Congrats on Eucalyptus! I’m a huge fan. Here are my questions:

People these days like to digest music quickly and efficiently before barfing it back up and moving on to something more buzzworthy. With no singles, an hour + run time, and songs that are tense and delay gratification, it seems to me like Eucalyptus is the most Anti-2017 album of 2017. Was any of this intentional? Were you trying to combat today’s vapid consumerism by creating an album full of slow, dense material?

Eucalyptus seems VERY spiritual and meditative rto me. Do you have any spiritual practices you do regularly? What are your thoughts on organized religion?

I was watching an AC live show from the Danse Manatee era last night. It’s striking just how eerie things seemed back then. What was playing those shows like? Did you find it took more courage to get on stage and play such abrasive music? Will the Danse Manatee tour documentary ever be released??

Avey: I wasn't trying to combat or release a record in response to the things you are talking about but i do agree with a lot of what you are saying. putting out something like a "Single" holds a lot of weight and i didn't feel this was that kind of record. i didn't want to break any of the songs up or out. Also i think its a shame that when you put out a single track from a record, people tend to over play it and it's not as interesting to listen to in the context of the whole thing once that comes out.

I meditate daily. It's a lot of breathing and also mind work. I don't participate in organize religion.

It takes a lot in general to get up on stage still. Not because of nerves but i want to give everything i have. Its a lot of energy. It was more nerve racking back then but the sentiment and feeling i put into it is still the same.

Avey on nature and how it's a part of his music

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Q: hi dave! i loved your performance in miami with coral morphologic, and i loved that quote you included in coral lords. there has always been a strong nature influence in all your work, soundwise and lyrically, and i wanted to know if you wanted to share more about how you go about connecting organic sounds and natural things to your personal life. -much love, vi

Avey: I think because i connected my natural surroundings so much with music when i really got into music it became crucial for me and all of the AC guys to have that element in the music. i think having portable mini disc players really changed things for us cause it allowed us to go anywhere and record. And so we'd goto a lake and jam or into the woods and jam. Much like Meeting of The Waters. When we'd listen back we'd start to pick up on how the random ness of nature becomes not so random and we'd hear patterns and things working really well. I still do this all the time. So basically we wanted to start composing music that had space for this.

Avey on the octatrack

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Q: hi avey, it seems like the octatrak has been a big part of the anco live set and now also a part of your image. what is your favorite feature of the octatrak? how would you describe your workflow?

Avey:I think the octatrack is a very challenging piece of equipment. Took me awhile to really figure it out but i think my favorite thing about it is that i can use it in my own personal way and don't really have to worry about a way I'm "supposed to be using it"

I usually have songs in mind and written when i start using the octatrack so i often just use it for orchestrations like on eucalyptus. i don't use it for writing really.

Avey

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Q: I think the octatrack is a very challenging piece of equipment. Took me awhile to really figure it out but i think my favorite thing about it is that i can use it in my own personal way and don't really have to worry about a way I'm "supposed to be using it"

I usually have songs in mind and written when i start using the octatrack so i often just use it for orchestrations like on eucalyptus. i don't use it for writing really.

Avey on editing his own work

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Q: Hi Avey, Love the new record! When first creating a song how do you balance your creative side of adding instrumentation and shaping the feel of the song to the analytical side of editing your self? Do you record lots of things then later edit your self or do you edit in real time?

Avey: When i'm writing the songs are usually pretty stripped down at first. Especially with these songs. Ill record myself playing the song then take a break from it and then go back the next day listen to what i recorded and decide if feels right or sounds good or if i need to change some melodies. Sometimes this process carries all the way to the studio sometimes songs just stay the way they are. In terms of sounds and production its the same thing. i tried to compose all my parts for eucalyptus before i recorded them because i wanted the flow to feel really organic and live when recorded. But certain things i came up with as we were recording such as the santurn parts in Ms. Secret and some of the more riffy guitar stuff. These days it always feels best when i have more then i need and it feels good to take stuff away.

Avey on his past Halloween costumes

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QUESTION: What were some of your favorite Halloween costumes as a kid or an adult? Do you have any costume ideas brewing for this year?

Avey: I've been pretty happy with my halloween costumes over the last years. It's my favorite holiday. I was really happy with my charred robot from the end of the movie West World costume from three years ago. Also two years ago i was a dada ist women in mourning.

Avey on the inspirations behind Eucalyptus

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Q: Hi Dave! I loved this album and it's made my best of all time list. What were your inspirations for making this beautiful album? Will you ever play in Mississippi or Memphis?

Avey: I would love to play in those places. Hope it can happen.

Inspirations...California. Seasons. Ends. Beginnings. Birth. Death. My friends. My loves. My family.

Avey on what material will make up his upcoming tour

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Q: Hi Dave. I loved Eucalyptus. So different yet complimentary to Painting With.

My question is, on your next tour, do you plan to play any of your older songs rearranged to match the tone of Eucalyptus? Or will you be entirely be focusing on new music.

I can't wait to see you on tour. I'm driving to Minneapolis from Winnipeg.

Have a good summer

From Andrew

Avey: Im thinking my tour will be a mix of eucalyptus songs and newer songs I've been working on. I hope to have a large bag of tunes i can switch around from night to night but we will see.

Avey on the connection between Meeting of the Waters and Eucalyptus

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Q: Hey Avey! Long time fan, first time caller

I was just wondering, can you elaborate on the relationship between Meeting of the Waters and Eucalyptus? They sound very sonically similar and obviously the inclusion of "Selection of a Place" in both ties them even further together. Were they envisioned as companion pieces from the offset? Thanks!

Avey: I think it was just the timing of when the songs were written and having selection to work with. I felt it would fit into what we wanted to make down there and i didn't have a lot of time to write new material for it so i decided to include that song and brian liked it so we went with it. But Meeting of The Waters kind of came out of nowhere and really fast. Eucalyptus had been on the horizon for a bit at that point.

Avey on "bad" audiences and his favorite snacks

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Q: Hi! My name is Aliyah and I'm such a huge fan. I listen to your music every single day and your lyrics speak to my heart and the way I experience emotion in a way that I've never experienced in music before. You make me feel at home in my feelings so I wanted to thank you for that. You are my favorite lyricist and I will always be grateful to you for your wonderful sentiments. So, here are my questions! 1) I saw you in Sioux Falls, South Dakota (where I live) in October and I was extremely disappointed with the crowd for not dancing or singing much or interacting in other ways. Is it disappointing for you when you play a show where the crowd isn't hyped, and does it make the experience of playing the music different for you? Would you ever consider going back to a location where the crowd isn't as receptive as you're used to? (Btw I loved it, it was an amazing show and I'll cherish the experience forever!!) 2) Which people in your life have had the most influence on the way you see the world? Have you always felt like a sensitive and emotional person or does it come in waves or phases? I've always related to the lyric "I have a coat of feelings and they are loud." But being a more emotional or sentimental person can make life more difficult (at least in my experience.) Is it hard to be a feeling person in the world of music/entertainment or while dealing with any level of fame? 3) do you have a favorite snack? Answer none or all or any you prefer. Thanks so much again for everything you have created. You are truly an inspiration.

Avey: Its always a little disheartening when the crowd feels like a stone wall staring back at you. But it's hard to predict. It definitely doesn't stop me from going back. It's funny sometimes ill read fans comments about shows and some will be like "sorry the crowd sucked" or "what a lame crowd" and i will not have had that experience at all and perhaps thought the crowd was cool. So i think it's important to keep in mind everyone experiences it differently and that even if a person isn't dancing their face off they are getting something out of the show.

Ive been eating a lot of cantaloupe this summer

Avey on playing ODDSAC live, having no favorites out of his work, and MPP

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Q: Hi Avey! Welcome to our little corner of the internet, I among others are very glad you've decided to pay us a visit. Animal Collective and your solo work have been a really important part of my life for a while now, it's really changed me for the better. I have a few questions:

(1) Are you ever going to play any ODDSAC songs live? Mr Fingers and What Happened are some of my favourite songs of yours ever.

(2) Which of your studio albums (whether it be AnCo, Terrestrial Tones, solo or otherwise) was the most fun to write and record? Why?

(3) Merriweather Post Pavilion is one of the very few albums I consider to be perfect, so it would be interesting to find this out: What would you do differently? If you were recording the album today, what would you change?

Avey: No plans to play odd sac stuff live but you never know. We've changed our minds about things like that in the past.

Too hard to pick a favorite and they all signify really important times in my life so it's hard to discount any

I don't think i would change anything about that experience. It was a good time.

Avey on ASMR, Roamers, and live requests

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Q: Hey Avey, Cody here from the Missoula, Mt show! Thanks for taking the time to do this!

In the song that was playing while trying to complete the puzzle it sounds like there are some ASMR samples, perhaps from Gentle Whispering on Youtube. Do you listen to ASMR?

Is a Roamer the creative being that comes and takes you to a creative headspace (in the shower)? Leaving fans to ponder the lyrics?

Did you play Alvin Row because of the Slasher Flicks AMA request? (It’s amazing you listen to your fans!)

(Again thank you so much for talking with my nervous self at the MT concert, it meant a lot despite my inability to ask all the questions I had! You and AC are my biggest inspirations!)

Avey: No i don't really listen to it but some of that stuff fascinates my and i've always like voice recordings and whispering and so i find it's really good for sampling.

No Roamer is more of a person like me who travels around with love in their heart

certainly kept it in mind YUP.

Avey on home recording vs studio

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Q: Hey Avey! First off I love the new album! I wanted to know how you compare the making/recording of this album compared to the other albums in the Animal Collective Canon having Deakin record the album. Was it different from something like Enter The Slasher House? Thanks in advance and much love from Baltimore.

Avey: I feel like the only real difference is that we recorded it at home and it's been a while since i made a record like that. It just slows things down although I always have a deadline in mind. Recording in a studio can feel rushed and overwhelming sometimes cause i don't know the lay of the land. where as with this record and with down there, A lot of the equipment we used like the mics and pre amps and effx etc are mine and so I'm quite familiar with them.

Aveys advice to aspiring musicians

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Q: Greetings Avey, hope you're doing well! What kind of advice would you give to a young, aspiring songwriter who is trying to find "their" sound? Where do you personally look for inspiration for your music?

Avey: I think trying to break free from any influence in some ways is the best way. Don't doubt your gut feeling about things even if someone else doesn't get it or might not. Challenge yourself. Try making a song on an instrument you can't play.

Lectures on Bees

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Q: Hey Avey! just wondering what you have been reading recently

Avey: Some Rudolph Steiner Lectures on Bees.

Aveys favorite music from 2017

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Q: Hi Avey! Over the past year I've become a massive fan of your and all the other Anco guys work. Thanks for making music that has such profound impact on my and many others lives.

I wanna ask... what is your favorite 2017 non Anco family release? And maybe your favorite album overall? Thanks!

Avey: It's hard for me to pick favorite records cause they're all so different. Circuit Des Yeux is putting out a great record this year. Angel Deradoorian as well. I also really like the SlowDIVE record but I'm a long time fan!

Eucalyptus' sounds, favorite video games, slow vs fast music, dogs, cats

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Q: hiii avey im a newer fan but totally loving all your stuff!!! im super excited to see ya live soon!!

1- you've mentioned before 'jungle' sounds & themes in ur music, what sort of sound were you going for with this one?

2-which do you prefer, the slower stuff like eucalyptus, or more upbeat stuff like w/ slasher flicks?

3- what's ur fave video game?

4-dogs or cats??

5-any new music you've been into??

thank you so much for doin this!!! you're so rad

Avey: Expansive California Coastal sounds.
I like a balance. for this record it just felt right to keep it all slow and mellow.
Hard to pick a favorite. I don't play new video games but i like old nintendo games like legend of kage and megaman and the adventures of Link
I'd say both though i own two cats and no dogs.

Avey on choosing performers for Eucalyptus

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Q: Hi Avey! Thanks for doing this AMA. Whether as part of AC or in solo endeavors you all seem to have strict rules for who's involved in a project. Eucalyptus may be the most collaborative album in terms of how many songs feature another (non-AC) performer and how high their parts are in the mix. What drove this decision? Was it a hard choice? Thank you!

Avey: It's usually just a matter of what i hear in my head and how easy it is to make it happen. I mean like finding the right people or sounds. It happened rather easily with eucalyptus because i was familiar with all the people i asked to be involved and i knew they could all accomplish what i was hearing.

Avey on mainstream music, blending sounds, and Grateful Dead

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Q: Hey Avey! I cherish your latest release and have been listening to it on repeat.

I am an aspiring musician myself and your approach to music-making (particularly the ease with which you manoeuvre between styles and setups) inspires me greatly. That is why I have decided to ask you:

What do you think is the direction towards which mainstream music is heading nowadays? (with rock music having been superseded by hip-hop, according to latest reports)
How to successfully blend the electronic and the organic - do you think that such a task requires a specific approach, or can the either side be made subaltern in relation to the other?
What music have you been listening to most recently?
Cheers!

Avey: I don't really listen to a lot of Mainstream music. I love Kendrick Lamar and appreciate people that are in the mainstream really making their own stuff. But a lot of it seems so methodical to me now and pre packaged and manufactured. I don't really like to judge or be negative about it. Maybe some older people would say it's always been this way. But theres a sound in there now that just doesn't feel genuine to me.

It's tough. For us i feel like we kind of just grew into it but it's hard to force or plan out. Usually giving up control is the way to go.

The Grateful Dead

Avey on the seasonal qualities of ACs early music

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Q: What season and emotion could you relate Spirit They're Gone/Hollinndagain to?
What inspires your writing style, its endlessly changing and I admire it strongly.

Avey: Hmm Spirit reminds me of traveling back to baltimore on the bus from new york to mix it in the fall. So I'd probably relate that to fall. Autumn was always a pleasant time in baltimore while growing up.

Most of the songs on hollindagain take me back to the hot summer of 2001 when we toured with that record and played those songs all the time. So probably summer at night.

Avey on his old PRS, Julianna barwick, and Eric Copelands visual art

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Q: Do you still have the black PRS?

I've been listening to a lot of Julianna Barwick's music and it reminds me of some stuff AC has made. Have you ever listened to her music/what do you think?

Are there any 2D visual artists out there right now that you've been digging lately?

Avey: I do but it was busted at a show and so i don't really use it anymore.

I haven't listened to it really. Ill check it out.

Eric Copeland has been making some amazing paintings. I hope he will sometime share them with the world.

Avey on choosing effects for his music

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Q: what are your choice effects, for vocal as well as guitar? additionally, how has josh shaped your solo work

thank you for providing the sound track for the best 3 years of my life, your songwriting is unmatched.

Avey: I think for effects it's always different depending on how i want a record to sound. like for Down there i wanted everything to be drenched in Flange and space echo cause i thought it would make it very murky and swampy. For eucalyptus i really didn't want many effects on things but we used some delays and some moog filters here and there.

Josh has shaped things really just by being an amazing friend and funny person to work with. His confidence in what I'm doing is extremely uplifting. He's also becoming quite a proficient engineer. when we did down there it was really more trial and error and messing with the space we had and just kind of figuring out things as we went. For this record he was able to move things along a lot quicker cause he's been working at recording a lot longer now.

Avey on his pursuits as a solo artist

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Q: Hi! First of all I want to say thank you so much for all the music you’ve made over the years. Animal Collective is by far my favorite band, and your music has done a lot of great things for my life. I also really appreciate how you treat your fans, and go out of your way to meet and talk to us after shows, so thank you for that as well. It means a lot to us!

Eucalyptus is a really fantastic album, and there have been a ton of great ac releases lately as well. I’m always so impressed with the volume of quality stuff you and the other ac boys manage to put out on a regular basis. when you start to think about a direction for a song or album, how do you decide what to pursue as part of a solo project, and what to work on with the band?

Next question is a little off topic, but after a dj set you did with Deakin in Asheville in November, I gave y’all a tiny hand. did you keep it? have you learned to love it, or do you still think its weird?

Thanks for taking the time to do this, and I’m looking forward to seeing your show this weekend at MPP!

Avey: I think things just fall into place timing wise and sound wise. My solo records become a lot more conceptual to me at first before the songs are there and they are something i think about for awhile before i make them. where as AC records come from many minds so it's a lot more about playing things together and finding the sound in there and seeing what works. Usually it just feels like theres a time for group stuff and a time for solo stuff. Right now I'm writing so much music actually that it's hard to know what will happen with it. But it also feels good to not worry about it right now since we are sort of in between things.

Avey on long drives vs. long walks

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Q: Hi Avey! Do you prefer long walks or long drives?

Avey: I like Both. I've been really into long drives lately. If you would have asked me this a couple years ago i would have said walks but now it's tough to decide.

Avey on getting in the mood to write, cassette releases, and having no favorites

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Q: Hi Avey! Big fan of your music, especially loving eucalyptus so far. My questions for you are:

1) What do you do to get in the mood for writing?

2) Will we ever see any of your stuff on cassette? (I sure hope so)

3) what is your favorite song you've ever written, and who/what is your favorite band/singer.

Keep up the good work!

Avey: i usually just relax for a bit in the am but then get into writing soon after. I also like to get any errands i have out of the way so i don't have to worry about things while working on music. Ill listen to music often to get into a playing mood.

I love cassettes so hopefully

Thats too tough of a question.

Avey on memorable band practices, Pet Cemetary, and his favorite (spoiler: none) guitar pedal

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Q:
My first question is, What was the most memorable band practice you've ever had?

My second is, What was the one horror film that freaked you out the most as a kid?

And lastly, What is your favorite guitar pedal?

Avey: two that come to mind are one where noah threw his drum sticks at me after playing one song cause i wasn't being very nice (it was a long time ago) and the session where we put banshee beat together. I just remember us all smiling and feeling like we had something really sweet happening.

Pet Cemetery Just because of the Zelda footage.

Don't have one.

Avey on the lyric-less noise in Kinda Bonkers

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Q: It sounds like you are saying “it’s like I’m a man of oil.. Jesus Christ!” right before the second “are you seeing me?” part in Kinda Bonkers can you clarify what the actual lyrics are?

ETA:

Do you have any intention of recording and releasing any of the new material you debuted at the Mothlight? Likewise with the Coral Orgy show?

Keep on doing what you do, you're making the world a better place... one earhole at a time!

Avey: It's definitely not that but i sort of made that up on the spot and it was recorded many years ago at this point so i can't really remember.

Avey on sequenced sounds in Eucalyptus

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Q: Hey Avey,

I was curious how you recorded your new album. There are so many sounds on the new record. It's hard to imagine how they all come from a single person. Did you sequence sounds on a sampler while you played over top of them with an instrument?

Avey: Yup I sequenced most of the sounds on an octatrack. Some of the other stuff i over dubbed live after the initial takes were laid down. The remaining sounds are angel and Jessika singing and eyvinds orchestrations and susans pedal steel all of which were recorded after the initial session

[Fovrodi]

Deakin Sleep Cycle AMA

Deakin on the transparency of Sleep Cycle's kickstarter campaign

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Q: Is it just me or is Deakin's Sleep Cycle Kickstarter still kind of shitty? He essentially tricked people into financing his vacation and then pooped out a (really, really good) album seven years later.

A: if you go and look at the original kickstarter campaign you will see that the entire project was transparent about the donation aspect. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/le ... posts/4701 the project was updated to make that clear well before the deadline to back the project. all donors were given the option to back out and some did. at the time my label Paw Tracks offered to pay for the travel expenses as an advance on the album's future release. since then, I decided to self release and as a result have paid Paw Tracks back for the original advance. none of the remaining donors made any complaints about the money being donated to TEMEDT and they all understood that the funding for the trip and promised rewards would be funded in other ways. there was no deception and the only real issue with this campaign was the amount of time it took to get to this point and the on again off again communication with the backers. in the end though, speaking as the person responsible for all of this..... all the backer that have communicated with the campaign over the years have expressed mostly support, encouragement and are ultimately very happy with the end result. understandable how confusing this whole thing must look from the outside, but in the end, those on the inside do not have the issues that critics who were not involved with the campaign are making. a tremendous amount of money was raised to support people in Mali. the campaign backers were aware of that and in come cases donated more once they learned that to be the aim of the money that was raised.

Deakin on Country Report

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Q: Country report sample? [Moby - God moving over the face of the waters]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tI1pu5 ... e=youtu.be

A: just cause I saw this and just finished the AMA. no it's not. eerily similar tho now that you point it out. played it on dave keyboard from CHz as we were practicing for that at the time I recorded Country Report.

Deakin on Sleep Cycle's tranquility and Ted Lucas

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Q: Hi Deakin! When I listen to Sleep Cycle, the album calms me almost to meditation, which I have rarely ever experienced when listening to albums. Anytime Golden Chords comes on, I immediately find peace and calm in myself. Did you purposefully intend to project a sense of tranquility through your music, and what album/song gives you that sense of tranquility in your own personal life?

A: i think i intended to project that to myself. i'm really glad that anyone else is feeling that. so much music that does that.... I really love the Ted Lucas record that was reissued recently for that kind of tranquility. surely not the best choice for that question. but a great record.

Deakin on writing Footy

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Q: I was wondering if you could provide any context on the lyrics to Footy, as the song really, really emotionally tears me up and I'm extremely intrigued to get an idea of what it means to the creator. My B if that's an overly personal question; don't mind me if that's the case. Thanks again!!

A: hey dude. that one is the most enigmatic to me too in a weird way tho it hits me emotionally a lot. I wrote the finalized version of those lyrics pretty much on the spot and I think even ended up ad-libbing a few of them. i think that I wanted it to have the kind of rawness and uncertainty that comes from that kind of space. you can look at one o the other replies I gave concering lyrics in Shadow Mine for some context on that... but I think that it's about seeing in someone... the way that they can have these duel parts of their being. and being kind of angry or frustrated with the amount of energy they give to the... being asleep or being awake. i guess for lack of a better word in the spiritual sense. need being this place where we can be very self oriented and NEEDing to have this or that. to be comfortable. to be high. to not be bothered. at the expense of the things that are really what make that person be who they are. and how incredible it can be to see someone when they let of that shit enough to wake up. 'm not sure if that really helps.

Deakin on Sufjan Stevens

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Q: I hear some Sufjan Stevens influence in footy. Age of Adz era, have you listened to him or did I make that connection up?

A: i've actually never knowingly heard sufjan. no disrespect to him. i've heard other people make that connection. maybe I'll check it out.

Deakin on Sleep Cycle's limited release

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Q: do you have any interest in letting somebody do a repress [of Sleep Cycle], or do you want to leave it as something special for the early supporters?

A: thank you ....
yes the cassette is most definitely a unique item that is for backers only. i have given some to friends and people that have supported me. there is some consideration of pressing to vinyl at some point. you can read my fuller answer to that in one of the other replies I gave.

Deakin on his favorite part of his trip to Mali

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Q: love the record! what was your favorite part of the trip you took to Mali?

A: seeing Khaira Arby and Super Khoimessa and Koudede. among others.

Deakin on drawing from his Animal Collective experience for Sleep Cycle

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Q: What did you primarily draw from your experience in Animal Collective when building the sound for this album? Thanks again!

A: so difficult to parse that out. pretty much all of the music I have made my entire life has been with those dudes. really don't know how I would make the distinction.

Deakin on lost gear

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Q: you mentioned the AC space flooding and losing a bunch of gear to that. did you guys lose anything irreplaceable or super important for live playing?

A: i lost a 12 string parlour acoustic from the 1920s. wasn't worth a ton. but i loved it and still miss. mostly everything was replacable tho.

Deakin on digital audio workstation used for Sleep Cycle

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Q: hey deakin! loving sleep cycle, especially footy. what DAW do you use?

A: logic. with UAD hardware.

Deakin on Geologists' headbanging

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Q: Do you think Geologist has a Repetitive Strain Injury from all his headbanging?

A: hahahahahahahaha..... no.. but lol

Deakin on the "AnCo" abbreviation

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Q: Does the abbreviation "AnCo" bother you? Forever you guys were the AC, suddenly it's "AnCo"... sounds silly, bugs the hell out of me...

A: eh... whatever... you know? it comes from a place of love and excitement about our music so I get it from that level.

Deakin on biggest challenges working on Sleep Cycle, listening to AC, and what season he'd assign to Sleep Cycle

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Q: Hey Josh, firstly, thanks for doing this AMA! I have three questions I wanted to ask.

1. What were the biggest challenges for you working on your solo?
2. Coming from somebody who's part of a collective do you listen to the albums you are a part of and the albums you aren't a part of differently?
3. Lastly, if Sleep Cycle were attached to a season, which would it be?


A:
1. biggest challenge is not having someone else to handle the engineering. I love engineering records but when you are trying to get in the zone and at the same time keep your eye on levels or trying to tweak mic placement... it can be dizzying.

2. yeah for sure.. when you work on a record... at the end of that process you have heard those songs from so many different angles and perspectives. over and over and over again.. no matter how much you love it there is a place where it can become hard to stop listening from a critical (gotta get this mix right!) perspective and just lay back and enjoy it. when I listen to a record I am not on from the band or something solo... i can just let myself go in the music. it's aweosme.

3. I think it is right where we are... it's coming out of winter and realizing spring will come back. it early spring.

Deakin on recording Golden Chords

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Q: Hi, Josh. I fell asleep with music shuffling the other night, and woke up from a bad dream around dawn to Golden Chords. As I laid in bed, breathing to calm myself down, I truly appreciated the song. It resonated with me deeply, being relevant to my personal state. It made me cry. It felt warm and consoling, like a hug.

Anyways, the song's themes seem to revolve around handling change and reassurance, and from what you've shared, your life seems to have been in an ongoing state of flux. Are you talking to yourself in this song? Was it the most cathartic piece to create? If not, which song was?

A: hey dude. dudette?
first of all thanks. yes I think in the end it became clear to me that all of the songs were songs to myself. and that one is in some ways the most direct in that way. I think the whole thing was cathartic but that song did have a particular resonance. I think in part because I originally had a much fuller idea of the song and ultimately pushed myself to keep it very simple with a relatively dry single vocal take. rather than overdubbing the vocals. or correcting little moments where my voice cracks a little or doesn't quite nail the melody... it was important to me on that level to really hear my own voice without much else covering it. one of the first times that I really lay back with my eyes closed and listened to the completed version of the whole record... it hit me that I was mostly singing to myself and yeah... it was kind of intense. but really good. for me. the fact that something that I rreally thought was just for me is having a similar impact on you or anyone else... it's beyond humbling.. thanks for sharing.

Deakin's favorite things about Brian, Noah, and Dave

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Q: what are your favorite things about each of the other members of AC that most fans might not know about them?

A: i don't know how much of this will really sound like something you don't know. and these may not seem very interesting or glamorous.... and the things I say about one does not exclude one of the others from having the same qualities....

noah is one of the most determined and focused people I have ever met. since we were kids. it;s really inspiring. if there is a challenge that he puts his mind to... he will meet that challenge. sports. music. family life. it's incredible.

brian is about as solid of a human being as I have ever met. if that sounds dry it isn't. he just knows how to hold it down. he is always one of the first people that I go to if I need advice or perspective. he is also the person I love to go SCUBA diving with more than anyone.

dave is one of those people that illuminates the magic of life. that can be with music obviously. but his energy is just really powerful in a very unique way. sometimes it just means laughing really hard. or the particular experience of going on long wandering walk together. he is also one of the funniest people I know.

hmmm... not sure how unique any of that is. love those guys deeply...

Deakin on his favorite electronic dance music

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Q: Hey Deakin,

We messaged a couple of times on CA and you were real sweet. I listened to the album you recommended me (Ifang Bondi's Saraba) and I loved it to bits. I know you're super big on afrobeat and traditional music from the Sahel, but do you have any other "pet genres"? For example, my two big ones are afro-folk and Yugoslavian/Eastern European punk/synthpop.

Much love, Max

A: I'm a big fan of a lot of electronic dance music. or it's spinoffs. I like a lot of stuff out of the midwest. I think Omar S is incredible. check out tracks like... It's in the money d. or Psychotic Photosynthesis. (omar souleyman as well but different people and genres. hehe). Theo Parrish. Moodymann (holy shit... moodymann. the track How do u feel destroyed me)Kyle Hall. etc... footwork and juke. I'm a big fan of the teklife stuff. Rashad (RIP). spinn. traxman. european and german techno for sure. Kompakt and dial responsible for so many good tracks. I think Burial is incredible. his track rough sleeper is soooo good. There's other genres of course... but there's a taste of that...

Deakin on favorite tour memories and AC-related memes

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Q: Hey Josh. What's your favorite ANCo tour memory?

A: there are a lot of tour memories. a lot of really really good ones. i think if I could really go back to a certain feeling tho of being on tour in a way that would make me nostalgic.... I think some of the early tours where we were driving ourselves in an old minivan. i mean... it wasn't without it's challenges. but there was something about that time. just 4 friends in a van hurtling across the country in a van listening to jams. making each other laugh... and even some of the harder stuff of just... getting on each other's nerves... whatever... it was a really special time. but there has been great stuff since for sure. I think as we have gotten bigger and play more standard venues and tour in busses... where you leave the show and sleep on the bus on the way to the next city instead of crashing with some locals or getting a hotel... you start to have less of a unique experience in city to city... but I'm certianly not complaining about that either... don't read it that way. i generally really like touring.

Q: Thank you for answering my question Deakin! Also btw, just want to apologize about all the memes that were surrounding you. I always believed that as a musician, you bring great value to AnCo. Again, thank you for your time Josh/Deakin.

A: no sweat dude. I think I get the whole vibe a lot better now. don't always relate to it. but there's no need to apologize.

Deakin on writing Shadow Mine and his creative approach to Sleep Cycle

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Q: are there lyrics to "Shadow Mine"? i feel like i can make out a few words here and there

A: that song was recorded as an improv in a bit of meditative state. yes... there are words trying to poke out there. when I played these songs live throughout 2010 I never could commit to lyrics. some of that was that it is hard for me to commit. but the other side was the discovery process that came out of playing shows where every night you knew the melody but the words were gonna come out differently and sometimes I would surprise myself and sing something that I really liked. I think when I was putting together this record that and Seed Song felt really important to put in to the flow to sort of honor that time. honor that these songs all came out of that sort of attempt to let the subliminal out to the surface. does that make sense?

Deakin on writing/recording solo vs. as a group

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Q: do you find it easier to write and record music as a solo artist vs. as a group?

A: so different. for me at least. I think in some ways... it was easier to do wide eyed with the dudes because I didn't have to make every choice. and there is something really great about having a foundation or an idea and having like minded people who can offer up good and surprising additions or interpretations that might make you hear something you wouldn't have on your own. I guess I am really just speaking as song writer now which is clearly less of what I have done (for now..... ) but I think the flip side is that... when you work with other people and you are hear something in your head... sometimes there is something really special and unique that you can only find by keeping the process to yourself. so I guess I am sort of learning how to value both. and the truth is that my perspective on what it means to help someone else realize their song is changing as I experience more of my own songwriting. that's a little hard to explain... but... i think that in ways that are a bit too intangible to describe... i approached the process of working on CHz much differently than any previous record in large part due to my own realization of what it felt like to offer up a song you wrote to other people. so as is the case with most questions like this... the answer is... both and neither. hehe

Deakin on varying visions for each album and favorite live performance

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Q: Hey Josh!

I love on Sleep Cycle the cohesiveness of the songs and transitions, so I was wondering when you make music do you generally think of the sound of the album/EP as a whole or work song by song and think of ways to stitch them together afterwards?

Also, what was your favorite live performance? Wether it be solo or with AC?

A: in this case it was bit more of the latter to be honest. once I started stitching tho it really made everything make a lot of sense. but certainly worked the opposite way with a lot of the AC records. CHz being a very talked about example. developing a pallette and an overall vibe going into the writing process really shaped what that record ended up sounding like. or... as was talked about a bit on another question... having dave's vision of a swamp for down there informed so much about how we did it all that it was a really fun challenge through each song and in the stitching.

so many great concerts that I love a lot from every different era. it's hard to compare the wild experience of the famous church show in 2002 with the "special" pizza or the quietness and immediate intimacy of the campfire songs show at Tonic in NY to something like a great show at 9:30 club. or playing at MPP. my mind is searching for a good story anyway... if i one pops into my head I'll come back to this...

Deakin on effects and pedals

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Q: there's a certain guitar sound that i've heard you use a bit (most specifically the guitar riff in footy) that i really like and it's a lot like a sound i've been trying to get but haven't quite figured it out. could you help me out as to how you get that kind of sound/what effects you used? sounds like maybe octaves (1+2 octaves up?) and modulation (chorus?).

A: ahhh.. I'm gonna be annoying here... I think it's really fun to figure these things out on your own and discover your own ways to get there. you end up surprising yourself or finding something you like that you weren't looking for. but yeah... i like pitch effects a lot. I certainly like delays. maybe more than I should. and all types of modulation effects. flange. auto wahs. phasers.... Eventide makes some really cool pedals that I started using in 2009 right before I left for africa and they stayed a main part of my setup up through CHz. they are kind of expensive but they have a lot of variety and tweakabilty that I really have gotten a ton out of.

Deakin on West African food and his relationship with food

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Q: Hey deak, what was some of the food you ate in West Africa that you enjoyed?

A: the food was really simple generally. I have a complex relationship to eating meat so that was a part of it that was really interesting to me. I was raised vegetarian. the first time that I ate meat I was 17 years old. between then and about the age of 28 or so I ate meat pretty much without distinction. but in my late twenties I started to feel that i was out of touch with something that is important to me. by the time I went to africa.... i was seldom eating meat. but I think when I got there and I saw the reality of what food is and what it meant to a lot of the people who I saw with very little choice... it felt really wrong to turn down food based on what was clearly a very privileged choice. so I decided that I would eat anything that was offered to me as long as it seemed safe. and the things that you are warned about are actually vegetables more than anything... so I felt more caution when someone placed a salad in front of me than the goat stew and grain that is pretty much the staple. so I ate a lot of goat stew and honestly it was very good. nothing that I can really describe beyond saying it was what it sounds like... meaty and satisfying. I know some vegetarians would criticize that type of flexitarianism. but I still stand by the choice.

Deakin responds to a tattoo inspired by him

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Q: Just wondering if you plan on doing another solo tour like you did when I saw you at Hopscotch in 2010?

Also, you have been the member I have met the most so far and my latest tattoo


I absolutely loved Sleep Cycle and I can’t wait to hear more of what you have planned for the future! Have a great day and thanks for taking the time to talk with the fans!

Shout out to /r/animalcollective

A: hey dude... yeah.. that tattoo is pretty stunning. hope you like it!!! hehe.. read one of my answer above about my thoughts on touring.

[Fovrodi]

Sonic Boom recommends music similar to PBMTGR

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Q: Sonic give us a list of bands/albums that you are listening to recently. Maybe something with a similar feeling to these new songs. Thanks :p

A: Nothings ever quite as easy as that ...
I dont know anything that fits that bill.... ...honestly....
but i'd suggest thomas bangalter's solo work ,
MGMT congratulations - and the Air remix of 'it's working' . What's going on ? By Marvin Gaye
I hear a new World by the Blue Men (joe meek) , smiley smile & side 2 of Today by the Beach Boys
Save for a rainy day by Jan & Dean , Emperor Tomato Ketchup by Stereolab , Mama you've been on my mind by the Caravelles, and Poeme electrinique by Varese .......
Also for the neigh sayers , there are two full runthroughs in hi- fidelityville of mr Noah's ( heyheyhey) ATP showdowns.......but i'm not sure you'll need them ....but for completism maybe .....??
Full Kerpower pk x

Sonic Boom on Tomboy Vinyl mixing and The Preakness's many lives

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Sonic boom wrote:

Aplomb wrote:

ha....very good....
glad some of you can see trhe TOMBOY magic.......it's a mystery to me why the response was a tad muted...
PP is bitchin , as I think is YP too......but TB ? man.......those songs are the bomb......
i'll look into the Tomboy box lesslossless files 4 yous.....I think I said i'd ask after Tomboy box was done.....but I'll see what the deal is........the boxset has clearer mixes in my opinion - they're not noted as being differant as Noah did'nt wanna ream anyone , but they're all differant - constructed by running the vocals & the music as seperate elements and then recombining them . it add's a clarity not there in the Tomboy LP mixes ....
Cosplay was no spoiler ...... more an hors d'oevre.........something for the weekend....
expect the unexpected......
The preakness has been recorded a couple of times since the KEEP tape demo...
.....it's an awesome song......and has many lives.....not as many as a cat.....but less than a dog....
....like more than two.......... odds are still being weighed....silks measured and cut.....courses paced.....
heavy stuff......but all good things to those that weight .....
very xmas pk x

Sonic Boom on his PBMTGR tour absence

Spoiler: show

Q: Hey Sonic, I finally have something to ask...

When you two make it to Pioneertown, can you make sure it is deafening? Please make my ears bleed from pure joy. Thanks in advance.

A: ...hey
...well.....I wont be there in person ....but in spirit , for sure !
.....but pretty sure Chris 'Panzer Bear' Freeman will knock it into 2020 for you.....
...I have other missions.......
..alas......'something for the weekend ' is just a you phemism...
I realise with a depth of 3 the code isnt easily broken.......even by me sometimes..
.....but the journeys more interesting , hopefully.....what a joke to joke no joke , eh ?

.....i wish i could make your interpretive dreams come true tho .......
......sure those days'll come .....
Psyched yr psyched we're psyched .
PK x

Sonic Boom on Panda Bear's 2010 tour crew

Spoiler: show

Sonic boom wrote:

....meet Panda Bear's personal Kreuwe of Kaos 2010 ......

left to right - Brad Truax - Feldpolizei , Tour chief , mineral ...
Sonic boom - Klangeffekte ,stage sound , vegetable ...
'Il Panda' - the Wizard of Odd , Animal...
Chris Freeman - Front of House sound ,Shock & Awe , vegetable .
Danny Pereztriana - Retinal shifts & Tactical blinding mineral

goodtimes......pk x

Sonic Boom on Panda Bear's PBMTGR Gear

Spoiler: show

Sonic boom wrote:

i think someone identified it earlier as two Octatracks and a mixer (the big thing)

The mixer is a studiomaster . Choice of champions ....!
The effects box he goes to on his r/h is an
earthquaker devices 'disaster transport sr.' Their uber delay/rev box,
Earthquaker devices effects are allover GR like a shroud ....
sorry cant help w the magic trix ......,, all spell & potion power currently deployed
in studio . Shazzam pjk

Sonic Boom on Tomboy boxset limited release

Spoiler: show

Sonic boom wrote:

real slippi wrote:

Sonic boom wrote:

Told yu guys the preakness would ride again ...

can you give any kind of insight as to if/when there might be a digital release of all of the instrumental and a capella tracks from Tomboy? I believe it was mentioned that it wouldn't be until all the box sets were sold - are there still a ton left?

any info is much appreciated!

hey buddy
it's been kook cake central with the GR .... Last I knew some TB boxsets still remain . tons ? I doubt it , but the deal was as the proceeds from that box were to Cancer research it's important that it isnt denied by all the trax being available online . It's also unfair to stores who have copies for sale etc etc . but i'm good for my word . you'll ave to trust that . my email is easily available .
i'm sorry it could'nt be sooner ......
from experience , i'd hazard that the GR release will sell the reamaining TB's (dont ask me why , but it'll happen ) . then , if Paw tracks & noah r down i'm happy to let them out ....Lord at least i'll try.......
pkx[/quote]

Sonic Boom on selecting Tomboy songs for acapella/instrumental and mixing the Boxset

Spoiler: show

Q: Did Noah ever say why he selected those particular songs [for the Tomboy instrumental/acapella boxset] or chose not to select others for the a capella/ instrumental disc?

A: That was my little project.......Noah is super modest about his tonsils
They were mostly self defined by the songs he sings , literally , all the way
thru , which is one of his fave modes ..... The accapelas only work because thete
Are no real gaps
To give Tomboy Box special powers , i ran vocal only mixes and music only mixes
and re- combined them . It gives the processors more chance to meet the magic
and gives more detailed mixes . it wasnt hyped as no-one wanted to make people
feel they were being swamped with 'product' for the sake of it .
but that's where the mixes originated ......
The instrumentals were just the trax that sounded awesome even
without Mr Noah's midas tongue .

Thats sweet with the cake talk ... ... wow....
Yr Metaphorical kook cake in the shark pen .....
thats all it takes......but the thought is touching....
Very xmas ....... Pkx

Sonic Boom on hanging out with Noah

Spoiler: show

Q: Hey Pete.

when you and noah aren't working on music - whats your favorite way to chill together / take it easy?

A: ....maybe a meal at the 'bestaurant' with our wives .....or a burger with the Crocs down at the zoo...
a nice cold glass of mateus..... silly but amusing jokes.....talking about music ....a lot of talking about GR........wordplay games.......talking about missed friends...

thats kind re: Touch the stars.....thank you .....

Sonic Boom on Panda Bear's songwriting

Spoiler: show

''besides, lyrics are the least important part in music, unless you are a 12 year old girl who likes to sing along to the songs. panda bear largely get's by because his melodies are that good, not that he's a great lyricist.''

I confess , I must be a 12 yr old girl .........haha ......
I would disagree on a couple of points , ventured here & close by.....
I think Noah IS a great lyricist .....r u saying 'tropic of cancer '/ 'no joke' or however u call it isnt genius?? . the lyrics are lethal.....direct heart hit....
.....those are'nt harps u can hear . it's the fragile oscillations of heart strings 'singing' in sympathy...

music , for me , is organised sound . or sometimes disorganised sound ....
I think he has a knack of pooling chaos , then parting the waves to reveal something uniquely brilliant .
....and its usually his voice & those words that do the lions share of that.
but thats just my opinion , and really , whatever turns you on about it is fine by me .. pkx

Sonic Boom on the meaning of "Tropic of Cancer"

Spoiler: show

Q: Tropic of Cancer....that's really cool. but also pretty sad considering the subject matter.

I knew SB would have the right idea re lyrics/noah's lyrics... You should collabo on some lyrics with Noah, SB. Yr posts are like song lyrics lol

A: I think it's reff'ing Henry Miller & The circle of latitude and its solar zenith as much as the big bad C .
mr Noah is a cancer.......I remember he told me us Arachnids & Crustaceans are menna b tight .....
something to do with our exo-skeletons .....
....or maybe it was to do with walking sideways .......i forget...

Sonic Boom on PBMTGR gear

Spoiler: show

Q: just curious, sonic.. if panda is making his own samples for this record, does that mean that we're hearing like analog synths and stuff like that in the songs?

A: Its samples from the record . Mix of moogs , EMS , Fenix ,Arturia soft-synths
Old digital Yamaha Fm stuff ..... All sorts ......The fenix has hybrid qualities - digital
noise generators & analogue filters ....pretty even score ....
........Humans 4 Robots 5 ....injury time 'll decide it all...
Pk

Spoiler: show

Sonic Boom on vocoder and the end of Sequential Circuits

Spoiler: show

Q: also, sonic! there are parts to me that sound like vocoder/death, especially the end of sequential circuits (that part is especially terrifying when stoned in a dark room)

is the vocoder/death saying anything? like lyrics or something?

A: I hope death sounds like a vocoder .....

A female one w enya's tonsils ....

Its just loops of vowel formants processing summit from the track
I'm sure 'yoyoyo' means sum thing in at least one language......

But mostly it's just saying
" c o n n e c t t t t " Xpk

[Fovrodi]

Dug up some stuff I don't think has been posted from the old board

Avey on Strawberry Jam freebird and meeting a fan at a show

Spoiler: show

Q:i met you last night at panda's second show in nyc. as soon as i walked into the bowery you were standing there and began to walk away and i called out your nickname. we only talked briefly (i'm a tall skinny blonde white kid with long hair and was wearing a light blue shirt), and i mentioned that i'd gotten the six freebirded songs and couldn't wait to hear the rest. i mainly just want to make sure that i didn't offend you in anyway. i definitely wouldn't have said anything like that if a) i hadn't read that interview with panda saying he wanted the rest of the songs to freebird and b) i didn't plan on buying the vinyl the moment it is released. anyway, it was an amazing and surreal experience meeting you and i wish we could have hung out more, but i've never felt more at a loss of words. see you on the next tour!

Avey: no offense taken. I think we are all on the same page as far as kind of wishing the whole album would freebird at this point. At the same time we arent gonna be the ones who freebird it so that might seem strange huh. I think i met the dude that did that interview with noah too..cant remember his name tho...sorry if your reading...

Oh and I only ran off cause i needed to talk to noah and some others about some things and i knew that the show was gonna get hectic plus i wanted check out scott and eric. Otherwise i could have stayed down there. Gooooood shooowww.

dave

Rob Carmichael on Strawberry Jam album cover, responds to criticism

Spoiler: show

Q: This was on the promos, i wanted to know if it will be the real cover. thanks.

A: i can confirm that the original berry photo is, indeed, the cover of the album, as i'm in the process of designing it/getting it all put together (or i should be instead of reading message board stuff). the art is basically all photos, though handwriting does come into play.

i WILL say, that the version used for the promos is a little dim and the final version will be more bright/saturated/technicolor. it also won't be printed from a color laser printer (which always messes up colors).

i think, despite the face this the art is photo-based, most folks will see a real AC vibe in the final results. its more 3d real world collage than a simple cut up and overlaid paper collage.

Rob C.

[...]

okay. not sure why i'm posting about art stuff again, but the actual layout is pretty exhausting and i guess i need a break.

1) there are no raspberries in the photo. i can guarantee you that.

2) anyone who thinks that Feels/Sung Tongs is "beautiful" is probably missing the fact that on Feels all the kids are bleeding from their eyeballs and/or throwing up, one kid had been decapitated and the goat is similarly bleeding from its eyeballs. And Sung Tongs is two rotting skeleton/zombie people. Maybe the layout is less realistic and therefore more agreeable on those two, but content-wise, Strawberry jam is totally keeping with the AC aesthetic as far as i'm concerned.

okay. back to radio silence.

Deakin on his favorite color(?)

Spoiler: show

These days its the combination of dirty salmon pink and deep tropical ocean blue. changes a lot though.

[Fovrodi]

Geo addresses answering the same questions over and over again

Spoiler: show

Q: you guys seem to have a deep appreciation for hip hop and rap music (u guys have mentioned being big fans of ghostface and j dilla and others). what are some of your all time favorite rappers/rap albums? or even just recent ones you like? im trying to expand my horizons on the genre..besides spank rock and a few other ones, i havent been jazzed about a lot of recent stuff comin out.

on another tangent, have you guys ever thought about venturing into the genre at all? you guys are always changing, and seeing that your newer stuff is moving away from guitars towards electronics and samples, a hip-hop type album could be ridiculously cool/different. the idea of ac collaborating (although u guys really produce ur own music) with madlib or the rza is too much to handle.

A: i personally haven't answered this question because it's been asked a lot of times before. there should be a couple threads somewhere in the history of the board where we answer about our favorite hip hop stuff. we don't mean to be rude but coming to this board does take time, and while it's really important to us, we don't always have the time to answer the same questions every couple months as new people come on. i feel like a total dick saying this but before people ask a question you have to search to see if it's been asked in the past. if we don't answer something it's because we've answered it before, or because we don't know the answer, or because we don't feel it needs an answer. you guys can bump stuff because sometimes we just miss or forget things, but if it's been a while, chances are we decided the answer is no comment. funnily enough in all the time it took me to write that i could have just named a bunch of hip hop dudes i like.

source

Geo doesn't like a song with a similar title to an AC album

Spoiler: show

Q: [Fair To Midland - Dance of the Manatee]
[s]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Svx-TT565U[/s]

i just heard this song on the radio the other day...

so are you guys planning on sueing or what?...

A: that song seemed a lot longer than it really was.

source

Geo on releasing a live DVD

Spoiler: show

Q: Is there any chance for a DVD of live shows of AC and solo gigs? And a possibility of commentary? I would buy one for sure!

A: it's not something we've decided we'll never do so there's always a possibility, but not any time soon, if ever, as far as i know.

source

Geo on Animal Crackbox Sides

Spoiler: show

Q: I have a question, about how long is each side [of Animal Crackbox]? like 15 mins or 20?

A: each side is different based on what is on there, but they're pretty much normal lengths. the sides are split up based on era and content, not length.

source

Geo on a potential El Paso, TX live date

Spoiler: show

Q: a friend of mine heard from someone that is supposedly opening for you guys that night that you guys are playing there.

is this true? it is right in between your tucson and austin dates..

it doesn't say anything on paw-tracks about it.

A: i think so, but we haven't gotten a solid confirmation yet on our end which is why we haven't put the date up on paw tracks yet. i don't know who you would have talked to that's opening the show because we bring our own touring partners and because we play for so long there really isn't gonna be room for local support. going back east through the southern half of the country requires a lot of long drives and you need full days off to drive. but that el paso show opportunity came up and the drives before and after looked reasonable so we're trying to make it happen. there are a few other days off where we might add shows. like in between toronto and chicago, and in between austin and st. louis. we already have ideas we're working on so there's no need to flood the board now with requests for your town.

source

Geo on potential Ariel Pink DVD content (Note: Don't think this ever came out?)

Spoiler: show

Q:
Is this gonna be a bunch of music videos for the songs he's already released or is it gonna be like a film or what?

Thankd

A: i actually donīt know. iīve never asked him specifically what was gonna be on it.

source

Geo announces first MPP tour

Spoiler: show

Geo: [We're going on tour] or at least we're together practicing in europe already. not too much time over the next month to answer questions. actually to be honest, we're gonna be fairly busy with touring and personal travel until october or november. we'll be in touch here and there, but we may be absent a lot., so as usual, best to hold back until after we return to normal life. if too many thigns get asked while we're gone we'll probably miss a lot or not hav the time to answer everything when we get home.

going on tour again in a few days...as always, please keep it mellow or we may miss something. hope to see a lot of you guys out there on the road. byeeeee

source

Geo announces Tickley Feather as an opener

Spoiler: show

Q: hey guys do you know who will be opening for the webster shows yet? i just thought i'd ask because i dont know which night to go to and if you are having a different opener on each night, then i could base my decision on that.

cant find it on the paw-tracks site, so thanks!

A: tickly feather will be playing with us one night, but we've all been separated this summer and haven't had a chance to think about who else will be opening. but we'll get around to it.

source

Geo on WCWAR? video filming location

Spoiler: show

Q: hello

my question for you is this:
where was the who could win a rabbit video filmed? it looks super familiar!

thank you.

A: it's actually mostly done in josh's mom's driveway, which is near soldier's delight state park.

source

Geo expresses some frustration with posting-culture on forum

Spoiler: show

Q: Hi.

My fragile heart is overwhelmed with doubts.

Will there be some guitar during fall tour ?

I really LOVE the spring/summer set. but i heard more SJ and Feels songs would be played during fall, and i can't imagine Cuckoo Cuckoo, Reverend Green or Purple Bottle sounding more powerful than LP versions without guitar...

Maybe i am wrong, maybe electronic reworked versions could even be better.

But i am devoured by curiosity.

A: no idea and no deakin are the only concrete things we can say. we haven't gotten together to practice yet. you guys will just have to wait until the first show. given that we don't know what we're gonna do there's not much point in you guys continuing to argue over what we're going to do.

source

[Fovrodi]

Geo provides insight on choosing venues for live shows

Spoiler: show

Q: hey its me, your lovely Colorado fan-base

is there aAaAaAany possible way you 3 could squeeze in a CO date September 19th?!?!

on ptrax theres a day gap, i imagine for a well-deserved break/tour of the west/midwest you guys may wanna hitup,

but Colorado is reachable/drivable going from LA to AZ and there'd be a wonderfully large turnout, as I manage a facebook group specifically for yous guys and could definitely spread the worde.

i CAAAAN road trip from here in boulder to tuscon for the 20th show, as my dad was thinking of movin from w. virginia to tempeh, Arizona in the next month or so, so it's pooooooossible, but I would reaaally love to see you guys in Colorado and have a fairly large group of chil'n that'd LLLLLOOOOVVVVVEEEE to see you gents throw it down like you did if not more than you did at Cervantes earlier this summer

everyone flipped on how great the show was and had a friggin blast and if i could recommend some venue possibilities i'd say:

denver:

ogden theater (small/intimate/doable/fun)
fairmount theater (pretty sizable/crazy gorgeous chandeliers/great sound--saw cake/gogol bordello/tegan & sara there---very sick)

boulder:

fox theater (it's a given: right down the street from me/fantastic turnout crowd/right at epicenter of CU campus/great history&staff)

boulder theater (mad intimate/clean/small-ish/chiiiiiiiiiiiiill & also super close to campus)

i know this all is essentially beg&plea meets self-centeredness, but i'm positive there'd be a HUGE appreciation/turnout for it and ppl would really love you for it, not to mention it would open ppl i know round here to a wonderful array of sonic variation

also, my facebook group ppz be breathin down me neck bout it, at least my friends on it tell me in person....garsh i know no one... :~

thanks for urthang

_D_

A: maybe its reachable if you are just driving to a show and walking in the door as it starts and leaving when its over, but not when you have to wait for the club to clear out before you load out, and when you have to be at the club the next day in the early afternoon for soundcheck. if we had a tour bus maybe, but we probably wouldn't play that great of a show after sleeping sitting up in the van all night. sorry. the reason we did colorado last time was because we knew we wouldn't do it this time.

source

Geo on a fan-organized interview

Spoiler: show

Q: This is partially a ploy to drum up interest in the IRC channel I threw together to come shoot the shit about AC or anything AC fans might have an interest in, but also I'm genuinely curious if you guys would be interested in doing this at all? Answering quick general questions on the fly that might be a little bit less focus-grouped than all this? And just if you're ever bored and want to have a conversation with your fans when you can't reach them on the road...

I'm sure you're busy guys and it's taxing enough just trying to get to all the threads on this board alone, but it can't hurt to run it by you all and further make people aware of our little IRC "cult" that's developing.

For more info about how to get into the established room, I think my sig covers it, but it's: irc.freenode.net / #animalcollective for those in the know. The sig is a little bit more user friendly.

A: to be honest it takes so much scheduling work for us all to get together in the first place that probably not. our time together is limited, even when it comes to the internet because of different time zones and home responsibilities. you guys might not get answers right away on here, but this is pretty close i think to a live chat. you just have to live with a different concept of time. our answers are probably better here anyway. i can't even instant message with the other dudes because it gets too stressful when you're typing a response and someone messages a new question before you've responded to the old. you end up just hitting enter after every 3rd word so they know you're still in the middle of a thought. it's not the way i like to converse. i never even log on to skype or im or any of those things because of that.

source

Geo on a [at the time] recent show and its guests

Spoiler: show

hey guys, the dj at our la show was our good friend zach [Note: Zach Cowie whose recurring show "Play it as it Lathes" can be found on NTS]. we have a few sweet dj friends in la that we usually ask to be on the bill. usually we do frosty from dublab, but now zach lives in la so we asked him this time. i can't give you an exact setlist of what he played, but right before we went on he played some tunes from the soundtrack to a early 70's australian surf film called morning of the earth which we had seen recently and loved. zach managed, as he always does, to track down the soundtrack on lp. it's never been reissued on cd to my knowledge, but the film is on dvd now. the rev found a copy at a surf shop in brooklyn. anyways, if you like zach's jams, he is part of an la-based dj team called small town talk, which does parties, and occassionally shows on dublab. zach also does a solo dj thing on dublab called turquoise wisdom. at least he did once. you can check out http://www.myspace.com/smalltowntalk for more info.

source

Geo reflects on Neumo's (Seattle Venue) Show in 2007, the nature of doing encores

Spoiler: show

Q: I know you guys are on tour, but I can't help but ask a few questions about the Neumo's show. I was the guy in the sheepskin hat who intensely stared at you (hope I didn't make you nervous or anything, but it was rather unreal for me) and then proceeded to interrupt your conversation with the girl in front of me by yelling "Geo!" and shaking your hand. What was wrong with the girl's friend? Sorry if it was out of line of me to do that. I also noticed you threw a shirt to some guy in the audience, what was that about? Why was there no encore? What would've you guys played if there was one? Was Eric Copeland's set supposed to be that loud?

A: ok dude, some answers...

- don't worry about the interruption. i didn't really know the girl...she knew a friend of mine from college and was just passing on a hello. i didn't see anything happen to her friend. i don't look at the crowd very much, especially people right in front of me.

- the entire venue was insanely loud, and all of our sets were louder and more abrasive than they should have been. definitely the loudest show on tour. whether or not it sounded good in the crowd is up to you guys, we have no idea how it sounded.

- related to that, is the shirt thing. the sub speakers were under the stage directly beneath my table, and due to the loud volume, my minidiscs were freezing from vibrating too hard, and twice, actually bounced off the table only to be saved by the chords connecting them to the mixer. we had a sheet we use to pack the skeletons lying on the side of the stage, so i grabbed what i thought was that, but it turned out to be some dudes shirt. when i realized my mistake and located the owner i waited for a break, tossed him back the shirt, and then grabbed my sheet, which had fallen off the stage.

- as far as no encore, pretty much every night we play for the same length of time and play 12-13 songs. whether we go off stage before the last 3 and take part in that ritual differs from night to night. we don't like doing it that much to begin with, and often dave just asks if people want to hear a few more. but then we leave and people get confused just like you did and think we snubbed an encore. so sometimes we play the game because we know its the only way people will understand that we're done. other nights we just say fuck it and stay on stage. but all we really did was play the set, and then did the encore without leaving the stage. you got no less music than anyone else on tour.

source

Geo on their merch guys

Spoiler: show

Q: sorry, this isn't a question.. but AC you guys have the nicest merch guy!... I saw you guys @ the phoenix on the 8th and i just had to throw out a thank you to the merch guy for being so genuinely cheerful and friendly!
I bought a beeeeees t-shirt (15$ thats kick ass!) ...and Avey! thanks for humouring us with our ridiculous t-shirts!-- it was amazing to see you guys live because i have never seen any band look so into the music as you all did, plus i am soo broke i never thought i would get to see it but 15$ for the show thats sooo rad... forever imprinted in my mind..THANKS!!!!

A: our merch guy is named ethan, and he is the sweetest dude around. reverend does it sometimes still but mostly he is just tour manager and light show operator these days. and ethan is not dave's brother.

source

[Chubby_Dork]

Fovrodi wrote:

Geo provides insight on choosing venues for live shows

Spoiler: show

Q: hey its me, your lovely Colorado fan-base

is there aAaAaAany possible way you 3 could squeeze in a CO date September 19th?!?!

on ptrax theres a day gap, i imagine for a well-deserved break/tour of the west/midwest you guys may wanna hitup,

but Colorado is reachable/drivable going from LA to AZ and there'd be a wonderfully large turnout, as I manage a facebook group specifically for yous guys and could definitely spread the worde.

i CAAAAN road trip from here in boulder to tuscon for the 20th show, as my dad was thinking of movin from w. virginia to tempeh, Arizona in the next month or so, so it's pooooooossible, but I would reaaally love to see you guys in Colorado and have a fairly large group of chil'n that'd LLLLLOOOOVVVVVEEEE to see you gents throw it down like you did if not more than you did at Cervantes earlier this summer

everyone flipped on how great the show was and had a friggin blast and if i could recommend some venue possibilities i'd say:

denver:

ogden theater (small/intimate/doable/fun)
fairmount theater (pretty sizable/crazy gorgeous chandeliers/great sound--saw cake/gogol bordello/tegan & sara there---very sick)

boulder:

fox theater (it's a given: right down the street from me/fantastic turnout crowd/right at epicenter of CU campus/great history&staff)

boulder theater (mad intimate/clean/small-ish/chiiiiiiiiiiiiill & also super close to campus)

i know this all is essentially beg&plea meets self-centeredness, but i'm positive there'd be a HUGE appreciation/turnout for it and ppl would really love you for it, not to mention it would open ppl i know round here to a wonderful array of sonic variation

also, my facebook group ppz be breathin down me neck bout it, at least my friends on it tell me in person....garsh i know no one... :~

thanks for urthang

_D_

A: maybe its reachable if you are just driving to a show and walking in the door as it starts and leaving when its over, but not when you have to wait for the club to clear out before you load out, and when you have to be at the club the next day in the early afternoon for soundcheck. if we had a tour bus maybe, but we probably wouldn't play that great of a show after sleeping sitting up in the van all night. sorry. the reason we did colorado last time was because we knew we wouldn't do it this time.

Geo on a fan-organized interview

Spoiler: show

Q: This is partially a ploy to drum up interest in the IRC channel I threw together to come shoot the shit about AC or anything AC fans might have an interest in, but also I'm genuinely curious if you guys would be interested in doing this at all? Answering quick general questions on the fly that might be a little bit less focus-grouped than all this? And just if you're ever bored and want to have a conversation with your fans when you can't reach them on the road...

I'm sure you're busy guys and it's taxing enough just trying to get to all the threads on this board alone, but it can't hurt to run it by you all and further make people aware of our little IRC "cult" that's developing.

For more info about how to get into the established room, I think my sig covers it, but it's: irc.freenode.net / #animalcollective for those in the know. The sig is a little bit more user friendly.

A: to be honest it takes so much scheduling work for us all to get together in the first place that probably not. our time together is limited, even when it comes to the internet because of different time zones and home responsibilities. you guys might not get answers right away on here, but this is pretty close i think to a live chat. you just have to live with a different concept of time. our answers are probably better here anyway. i can't even instant message with the other dudes because it gets too stressful when you're typing a response and someone messages a new question before you've responded to the old. you end up just hitting enter after every 3rd word so they know you're still in the middle of a thought. it's not the way i like to converse. i never even log on to skype or im or any of those things because of that.

Geo on a [at the time] recent show and its guests

Spoiler: show

hey guys, the dj at our la show was our good friend zach [Note: Zach Cowie whose recurring show "Play it as it Lathes" can be found on NTS]. we have a few sweet dj friends in la that we usually ask to be on the bill. usually we do frosty from dublab, but now zach lives in la so we asked him this time. i can't give you an exact setlist of what he played, but right before we went on he played some tunes from the soundtrack to a early 70's australian surf film called morning of the earth which we had seen recently and loved. zach managed, as he always does, to track down the soundtrack on lp. it's never been reissued on cd to my knowledge, but the film is on dvd now. the rev found a copy at a surf shop in brooklyn. anyways, if you like zach's jams, he is part of an la-based dj team called small town talk, which does parties, and occassionally shows on dublab. zach also does a solo dj thing on dublab called turquoise wisdom. at least he did once. you can check out http://www.myspace.com/smalltowntalk for more info.

Geo reflects on Neumo's (Seattle Venue) Show in 2007, the nature of doing encores

Spoiler: show

Q: I know you guys are on tour, but I can't help but ask a few questions about the Neumo's show. I was the guy in the sheepskin hat who intensely stared at you (hope I didn't make you nervous or anything, but it was rather unreal for me) and then proceeded to interrupt your conversation with the girl in front of me by yelling "Geo!" and shaking your hand. What was wrong with the girl's friend? Sorry if it was out of line of me to do that. I also noticed you threw a shirt to some guy in the audience, what was that about? Why was there no encore? What would've you guys played if there was one? Was Eric Copeland's set supposed to be that loud?

A: ok dude, some answers...

- don't worry about the interruption. i didn't really know the girl...she knew a friend of mine from college and was just passing on a hello. i didn't see anything happen to her friend. i don't look at the crowd very much, especially people right in front of me.

- the entire venue was insanely loud, and all of our sets were louder and more abrasive than they should have been. definitely the loudest show on tour. whether or not it sounded good in the crowd is up to you guys, we have no idea how it sounded.

- related to that, is the shirt thing. the sub speakers were under the stage directly beneath my table, and due to the loud volume, my minidiscs were freezing from vibrating too hard, and twice, actually bounced off the table only to be saved by the chords connecting them to the mixer. we had a sheet we use to pack the skeletons lying on the side of the stage, so i grabbed what i thought was that, but it turned out to be some dudes shirt. when i realized my mistake and located the owner i waited for a break, tossed him back the shirt, and then grabbed my sheet, which had fallen off the stage.

- as far as no encore, pretty much every night we play for the same length of time and play 12-13 songs. whether we go off stage before the last 3 and take part in that ritual differs from night to night. we don't like doing it that much to begin with, and often dave just asks if people want to hear a few more. but then we leave and people get confused just like you did and think we snubbed an encore. so sometimes we play the game because we know its the only way people will understand that we're done. other nights we just say fuck it and stay on stage. but all we really did was play the set, and then did the encore without leaving the stage. you got no less music than anyone else on tour.

Geo on their merch guys

Spoiler: show

Q: sorry, this isn't a question.. but AC you guys have the nicest merch guy!... I saw you guys @ the phoenix on the 8th and i just had to throw out a thank you to the merch guy for being so genuinely cheerful and friendly!
I bought a beeeeees t-shirt (15$ thats kick ass!) ...and Avey! thanks for humouring us with our ridiculous t-shirts!-- it was amazing to see you guys live because i have never seen any band look so into the music as you all did, plus i am soo broke i never thought i would get to see it but 15$ for the show thats sooo rad... forever imprinted in my mind..THANKS!!!!

A: our merch guy is named ethan, and he is the sweetest dude around. reverend does it sometimes still but mostly he is just tour manager and light show operator these days. and ethan is not dave's brother.

Thanks for finding these! Do you just use the wayback machine to find these?

[jfw7]

you do good work ITT fovrodi