The zootropic posse will be back in 2016 with new material in their tenth studio album, the elusively entitled, Painting With. Considering the various side-projects that they all have it’s impressive that Animal Collective still manage to have such a consistent output, but with eleven albums, seven EPs and a raft of singles in the last sixteen years it’s pretty clear that there’s still a lot of love for each other and the music that they create.
As ever, experimental pop is on the cards for the Baltimore foursome and while they often run the risk of coasting a little too close to the edge, there’s usually enough swerve to keep things ticking. You’ve only got to check out the new homepage for their website – https://myanimalhome.net/ – with it’s mad, psychedelic cursor function to see this in action for yourself. When you first land it feels like a crazed fruit machine, but nudge your mouse (that’s not a euphemism, by the way) and a whole world of kaleidoscopic wonder starts to cascade towards you.
Release date
Following up on 2012’s Centipede HZ and the 2013 EP, Monkey Been To Burn Town, the new record has been confirmed for a release date of the 19th February 2016. It’ll be available on CD, digital download and 180 gram heavyweight single vinyl LP and there’s a choice of three different versions of the album with Avey Tare, Geologist and Panda Bear covers painted by , which you can see in the image above.
Singles
Ahead of the album, Animal Collective have released just the one single in the African beats electro beachy day tripper, FloriDada, which you can listen to in the You Tube music video below. On the surface it can be discounted as being a little a bit trivial and maybe even simplistically childish with its chant of “Flor-ri-day, FloriDada”, but if you’ve spotted the title or the intro text to the video you’ll know it’s got its roots in a well known avent-garde movement.
Pop and art have long held pretty significant synergies and Animal Collective float on top of them with Dhalsim-like levitation in their new single. It may not be as well geared as What Would I Want? Sky or Panda Bear’s Boy’s Latin, but it isn’t without its merits and any nod to anti-art, anti-war and anti-bourgeoisie aesthetics is always a blast.
Track list:
- FloriDada
- Hocus Pocus
- Vertical
- Lying in the Grass
- The Burglars
- Natural Selection
- Bagels in Kiev
- On Delay
- Spilling Guts
- Summing the Wretch
- Golden Gal
- Recycling
First impressions
Being fairly big fans of Animal Collective’s work, especially their 2009 EP, Fall Be Kind, we’ve obviously got a healthy expectation for mind bending musical bliss with Painting With. FloriDada hasn’t exactly lit the touch paper for us, although it is a bit of a grower, so we’ll be hoping that it’s a part of an impressive whole that encompasses the entire album, which is exactly the kind of thing that they do best.
