Collected Animals

I do NOT want this to freebird. This is an autumn album. Deserves to be heard first on its intended date when the leaves are changing colour for those in the northern hemisphere. For those in the south, hope it links up with spring pretty well too!

Yeh, it'll be spring for me. I definitely see the Avey songs on IIN as very autumnal so planning a walk/hike where the dirt is red for my first listen or three.

@utensilvirus, I think it did sell out because I ordered mine the day it came out and got a confirmation and everything.

Also, wish I didn't jump the gun and get the purple IIN vinyl, shit kinda looks like Barney smh. If anyone wants to trade for a black vinyl, PM me. I'll also throw in an extra copy of that Avey Pharmacy EP if you want.

I can’t tell if my pm’s are sending, so just in case they aren’t: I can’t swap for this after all someone please swap for this purple vinyl!!

magicians->defeat->gem is gonna be ridiculous

i'm going the opposite route of time skiffs this time (ha!) and listening to a freebird asap... get these sweet tones in my ears

If we get a low quality freebird I’m gonna go listen to it in a public restroom just for the nostalgia

magicians->defeat->gem is gonna be ridiculous

Agree, but also soul capturer->genies->broke->magicians->defeat->gem->stride->clubs->kings is gonna be ridiculous.

I've only listened to SC maybe 6 times (and not at all for the last 4 days) but I am just continuously singing it in my head. So desperate to listen again but don't want to ruin the album experience. I'd accept a freebird ripped with a fucking iphone mic but I don't want to overplay one track (the opening track) before I've got access to the full thing!

freebird it now or I will shut down this board

I'm listening to the cains ballroom boot from oct 7 2019 right now. First time Ive heard it in a bit... when this happened, I was living in Vienna, and I vividly remember the bus ride I was on when I heard it for the first time. Filled with anticipation, just wondering what the hell it was gonna sound like. crisp autumn air. The energy of this show and this little moment in their career is so palpable, it's hard not to daydream about what both of these albums wouldve sounded like if the pandemic never happened. nothing like 2019 cherokee.

I'm so excited for Isn't It Now though, I feel like they got it right, soul capturer sounds ridiculously good. I'm really happy that it's coming out at the end of September, only a week away from when these songs first became part of my life, 4 years ago. so much has changed. so weird

great post, speen. resonate with a lot of that... we're so lucky to be fans of a band that not only gives us the "where were you when X album dropped" memories, but also the "where were you when you heard the first boot of a new era" memories.

i remember being highly intrigued, not quite yet impressed but definitely intrigued at the direction of their next era when i first heard those first 2019 boots.

you know what it was? i think cains is one of their best boots.. 2019 is one of their oddest years, cause of the songs they brought back... native belle and grass like damn

I want a freebird but I also want to listen to Gem and I in full quality before I hear the freebird. So if it comes the week after the next single drops that works for me.

you know what it was? i think cains is one of their best boots.. 2019 is one of their oddest years, cause of the songs they brought back... native belle and grass like damn

Not to mention banshee beat... 2019 was fuckin crazy.

FEEL ON1NE!!! wrote:

you know what it was? i think cains is one of their best boots.. 2019 is one of their oddest years, cause of the songs they brought back... native belle and grass like damn

Not to mention banshee beat... 2019 was fuckin crazy.

and for reverend green!

at the moment stride rite is intriguing me the most... really curious to hear why it's so different

at the moment stride rite is intriguing me the most... really curious to hear why it's so different

ya, and given it's willie's 2nd favorite after "Magicians" ... very intriguing indeed

Studio "Royal and Desire" was the most different from its live counterpart for the TS batch... i wonder if it's Deakin having a really specific aesthetic he wants to pull off for his songs in studio that can't be replicated live

Slippi's Applesauce wrote:

at the moment stride rite is intriguing me the most... really curious to hear why it's so different

ya, and given it's willie's 2nd favorite after "Magicians" ... very intriguing indeed

Studio "Royal and Desire" was the most different from its live counterpart for the TS batch... i wonder if it's Deakin having a really specific aesthetic he wants to pull off for his songs in studio that can't be replicated live

Its hard to imagine it will be totally different than what they were playing since this was recorded pre-tour but I guess we'll see.

I've always found Deakin's process interesting. Listening/watching through boots of his stuff he seems like someone who is really torn on arrangements/song structures/instruments even/etc. and that leads to his solo stuff taking a good bit more time than the other guys. I feel like there are some Sleep Cycle songs that exist in wildly different versions out there. Maybe I'm projecting a bit cuz I can relate to that kind of thing but that's the sense I get from the progressions of his songs.

great post, speen. resonate with a lot of that... we're so lucky to be fans of a band that not only gives us the "where were you when X album dropped" memories, but also the "where were you when you heard the first boot of a new era" memories.

i remember being highly intrigued, not quite yet impressed but definitely intrigued at the direction of their next era when i first heard those first 2019 boots.

haha that was around when i first got into them and i hated hated hated the boots. glad they turned it around and toned down the autotune. I would play boulder/boner to annoy everyone around me

Caved and listened to SC once and that is it. Damn. A++. This is going to be an absolutely epic album.

I listened to SC for the second time today -- decided I wanted to play it as comfortably loud as I could manage. Holy shit, this song has peaked. Really feels unlike any other song in their catalog.

this has probably been discussed and i can't find it, but what do you folks think SC is about lyrically?

someone had mentioned Paste's interpretation, which i like:

New single “Soul Capturer” is a plentiful folk song that ruminates on online life and the cyclical gratification of being clinically attached to the internet. “You need a hush, you need a push,” Tare and Panda Bear harmonize. “You need some tush. It gets you high, pulls you from the rapture every time.”

reading all the lyrics in that lens is a fascinating commentary on the internet, and i think it works. but i'm curious if others have a different interpretation?


but ya, if this isn't my relationship with the internet summed up, i don't know what is:

Soul Capturer it knows no feeling
Soul Capturer puts you in a cell
You'll lose your mind
Going blind
Changing sides every time
Soul Capturer leads to your demise
Don't tempt me
Don't know what I'm gonna do in there

Okay I've been thinking about something for awhile I want to get off my chest but I need to treat this like a math problem, so here are some givens:

1. I love these songs
2. I can tell I'm going to love this album
3. this rollout has been delightful and weird
4. the 2019 boots reignited my love of animal collective, or rather, reified it, I wasn't really feeling out of touch with the band or anything I kinda loved PW and the PW era tbh
5. the 2021 summer shows, similar
6. the 2022 tour was the best live anco show i've seen yet, including the (to me) legendary p4k 2011 set
7. all the wild and crazy speculation on this board has been the second most fun i've had on ca outside of the greaper year (and maybe bathroom flacs as a close third)

but with all that said, I cannot wait for this album to come out and for the band to put Time Skiffs and Time Skiff's 2: Isn't It Now? to bed. Its kinda bonkers to me that we've had some of these songs floating around since Music Box, and again, I love these songs, buuuuuuuuuuuut I'm getting fatigued, I wonder if the band is, too. Idk maybe I'm just being impatient but there's been a long, long buildup to catharsis and I know we're so close but I'm not sure how many more different live versions of "Passerby" I can dig on before the appeal of the next thing sours the appeal of the current thing. Especially with the incredible Spirit reissue I feel like all AnCo momentum has been looking backward. I wonder how they feel about it. I can't believe I'm thinking this, but I sort of hope after Reset wraps Panda and Deakin both get whatever solo work they have in the chute ready to go and the next time Animal Collective sets out on tour its the next thing. Would love a 2011-type set where they played almost entirely new and embryonic shit, I feel like we haven't really had a tour like that since those few shows in 2019.

Not trying to be a brat, to me one of this band's best features is their relentless and kinetic energy moving forward and not that the TS/IIN songs are mud we're stuck in but the wheels are kinda spinning.

Idk anybody else feeling this? what's the not insane entitled way to articulate this?

you're spot on, and i think everything you just wrote resonates with a lot of folks here. #1-5 is 100 percent me too.

unfortunately we can blame the pandemic for this protracted rollout. remember, they were planning on recording these songs (ALL of these songs) in 2020 before the pandemic hit. at worst we were going to have all these songs in studio form by the end of 2021 ---- or beginning of 2022 with a straggler EP or something.

because they split the songs into two albums, not an album + EPs or whatever, we've had to endure a pretty harsh waiting period, and it is wild it's been 5 years since MBV, but had Covid not hit, the period between live debuts and studio releases would've been 3 years, which isn't terribly different from their standard period.

Interesting to think about how these tracks would’ve been released had COVID not happened.

Pre-album single -> Album -> EP would be the usual route. And we may not have gotten Strung, SC, or ACAB had that been the case. What do we think that might’ve looked like, sequencing-wise?

I think they were always going to be two albums but I am positive that the recording of things from the Time Skiffs things sort of forced their hand as to what they felt they got right and what needed to be done in person. No way could they hand off files for Defeat and things.

What I do think they got right was the production. I think Skiffs and the 2 new ones are some of my fav AC production ever. Super warm and lush.

As far as fatigue, Im sure they are the most fatigued of all. I mean Isn't It Now was recorded and put to bed, what, over a year ago? Domino is notoriously slow and tries to milk the hell out of it. Im not sure I fully understand that mindset in this era of music. Skiffs had 4 singles out of 9 tracks. That is absurd to me. I know I am old but still. SO yea, they've been sitting on this album for ages. Im sure the band is well, well past that considering they've been playing some of the songs for 5 years already.

All that said, Im ready to inject IIN into my veins. I only did SC once and stopped Defeat a while ago.

When will then be now?

i’m sure plenty of people have been feeling that way, I don’t think this is the first time someone’s expressed the thought here either. part of that restlessness is the price we pay for being in that echelon of fans who dive into the minutiae and track the bands movements, speculate wildly after a single update, etc. — but then if we weren’t that sort of fan, we probably wouldn’t be as hyped either

we’ve been holding our breath for a very long time and I’m eager not only for these songs to come out but also to decompress after, enjoy the interviews and the profiles, maybe even read a review if they’re not too annoying, and pester my friends into listening to IIN?

I’m trying not too hard right now to think about what comes after that stage (although sinister grift doesn’t seem too far away). the big question mark is what the next tours will look like: it’s hard to imagine this band returning to the same setup and roughly the same setlists, but at the same time I can’t imagine they wouldn’t tour on an album that’s clearly very special to them and seemingly supported by the label quite enthusiastically (based on the press statement). it would be very weird if they didn’t take these songs on a victory lap tour, but hey, they’re a weird band

i like your thoughts Mingus, but i am almost 100% certain they will NOT do a victory lap tour for these songs. it's been documented the band is sick of playing this set of songs and that their favorite thing as a band is reinventing themselves. they haven't reinvented themselves since 2019, so surely next time they tour, it's going to be a new band set up and a new crop of tunes, and that excites the hell out of me. i guess there is a scenario they do a victory lap, but it's a mix of new songs and these songs played in a new style/band set up.

as superfans, it has been hard to wait, but regular fans of this band are probably incredibly surprised and excited that we're getting AC albums in back to back years for the first time since 04-05.

---

and i agree with you dervish on all points -- great post -- except i'm not so sure the plan was for two albums... i think they were planning a really long LP and then an EP or two, just by the way the band talked about ordering the tunes over the past few years... it seemed to me that the two albums was a compromise. Avey most of all seemed to hint at wanting to do EPs, and the way they were going to present these tunes was definitely noted to be a long complex conversation within the band, which points to me again as a reason this was not the original plan.

Think the plan was def double album and maybe an EP of loosies. Almost certain they mentioned a double album at one point. If it had been produced by Russell then Covid really did take more from the world than we can ever truly know

Domino is notoriously slow and tries to milk the hell out of it. Im not sure I fully understand that mindset in this era of music. Skiffs had 4 singles out of 9 tracks. That is absurd to me. I know I am old but still. SO yea, they've been sitting on this album for ages. Im sure the band is well, well past that considering they've been playing some of the songs for 5 years already.

Agree on this, but by the same logic releasing Defeat as a single is silly. With that song and Soul Capturer, 28 minutes of a 64 minute album (nearly half the album) is already out there.

I could see more logic to create "hype" if they held back Defeat and music publications woulda been like "whoa, the new animal collective record has a 22 minute song".

i guess there is a scenario they do a victory lap, but it's a mix of new songs and these songs played in a new style/band set up.

this is the ideal scenario for me — selfishly, i want a victory lap tour on IIN? material because the only tune i got to hear on the last tour was gem & i, and i need to hear defeat, genies, and/or magicians before i die hahaha

also thought about...... maybe they booked the 2022 tour (or at least the Euro dates) assuming that IIN woulda been out to coincide with the tour. but then IIN kept getting pushed out and out for whatever reason? not sure if something that they would have even had control of...

I'm probably in the minority here, but I think the pandemic is the best thing to happen to these songs. We got two albums out of these batch (in consecutive years!) vs. (in my opinion) a lengthier double album and maybe an EP and 7" or something.

ive heard some people potentially discussing a winters tour? not sure the validity of the claims.

with sinister grift still in progress (and at the very least not mixed yet, since panda said he was hoping deak would do it? or was that recording?) and deakin apparently not able to start recording his new album yet, id be surprised if they toured with a bunch of new material. i would love to be wrong, im also ready for this era to be put to bed

Crazy how we still don't know if Defeat will be on the album

Almost certain they mentioned a double album at one point. If it had been produced by Russell then Covid really did take more from the world than we can ever truly know

counterpoint: TS has aged really well for me the past year... still have some hang-ups with the studio versions, but we'll always have the boots anyway

If we get a low quality freebird I’m gonna go listen to it in a public restroom just for the nostalgia

still cracks me up that this was a thing. that random people heard painting with in repeat for 24 hours, like what if you worked there? would you lose it as a non ac fan?

i hope we get a band feature/interview this month -- can't wait to get a sense of where these guys are at with regards to these songs and future of the band........ don't really need another single, just need some HYPE

I think most of us mirror that sentiment - its been a long road.

that said, its a bit like graduation or something. you want it to finally be over and you're excited about the next stage of your life but at the same time you can't wait to soak it up and enjoy all the celebrations/parties etc that are going to happen.

IIN release will be relief but also party time.

Interesting to think about how these tracks would’ve been released had COVID not happened.

Pre-album single -> Album -> EP would be the usual route. And we may not have gotten Strung, SC, or ACAB had that been the case. What do we think that might’ve looked like, sequencing-wise?

folks have taken a stab at this hypothetical sequencing before, but i never have... so here i go.

hypothetical 2020/2021 double LP -- recorded to tape with Elevado on the boards

1. Dragon Slayer
2. 24
3. Genie's
4. Magicians
5. Cherokee
6. Defeat
7. Prester John
8. Down Down Down
9. Appreciate

while it's only 9 tracks, these would've all been 5+ minutes except Appreciate... pretty sure they would've had jammier intros to 24 and Dragon Slayer if they did a live band thing... this would've been a 75-80 minute album

Panda Pop & Avey Vocoder EP
1. Gem & I
2. Bolder
3. Broke Zodiac
4. Passerby
5. Stride Rite
6. Kings

Not sure if they would have existed
Strung with Everything
All the Clubs are Broken

Random loosie single post-EP
Soul Capturer

I think it’s more likely that Soul Capturer is the song that doesn’t exist

I think it’s more likely that Soul Capturer is the song that doesn’t exist

with how well this song turned out, with how special it feels, i'd like to think this song would've materialized at a later date in any alternate world

strung was played at an avey show in 2018/2019. also iirc avey said they couldnt get it right as a band in 2019 and it wasn't until the remote recording that they figured it out? or maybe january 2020. either way i think it would've existed in this alt universe