ANIMAL COLLECTIVE
STRAWBERRY JAM
DOMINO
WORDS BY: AW HENDERSON
In Animal Town
It was Musical Day
The orchestra
Had gathered to play.
Up to the platform
Each animal went,
And proudly carried
His instrument.
The gray Seals barked.
They lifted their fins,
And tweedled upon
Their violins.
The spotted Giraffes-
The oddest of fellows-
Zoomed and zoomed
On their yellow cellos.
The Lion bugled;
The Rhino fluted;
The Leopard harped;
The Tiger tooted.
The Monkey wiggled
A brass trombone.
The Llama blew
A saxophone.
The Elephant
Kept trumpeting.
The Camel plucked
His mandolin string.
The animal girls--
The animal boys--
The animal audience
Made a great noise.
-Animal Orchestra, by Ilo Orleans
Thank God for Animal Collective. If Joanna Newsom's Ys didn't completely smash the concept of "freak-folk" to pieces, then this, AC's best album to date, will. This is freak-pop. This is freak-fun. Or maybe even just fun. Yeah, that's it. Strawberry Jam is Fun-pop. This is the music that plays in clown heaven. All of the things that held Animal Collective back on previous albums have been discarded (mostly), and all of the things that have brought them more and more fans have been emphasized (thankfully). I've been driving around with this album on for the last month, trying to live as rewarding a life as possible, so that when I look back on the summer of 2007 I will have memories appropriate for the music I will remember them by. This is quality, gummy, scratchy, wind-in-your-eyes-making-them-water, jumping-into-leaf-piles music.
With Strawberry Jam, Animal Collective establish their dynasty. 2004's breakthrough Sung Tongs showed their promise, and 2005's Feels proved their caliber. Here is where it all comes together. Many of the terms used to describe the band over the years are no longer adequate; for instance, there's very little that's "tribal" about Jam, or "woodsy". There's not a lot of nature on this album, nor campfire chants. What there is here is electronic pop, screaming, beating on buckets, layers and layers of pencils tapping on desks, falsetto wooing, echoes and the sound of the earth sighing in contentment. I can't find a single guitar on any of these songs, excepting the looped two-second sample in "Unsolved Mysteries." Can you? I can't pick out a single instrument at all. The drums at the end of "Chores" sound like a lion's heart beating. The melody in "Winter Wonder Land" sounds plucked on a spider's web of steel thread. The percussive shuffle of "Derek" must have been sifted by a gold prospector crouched on the edge of some riverbank in a land where music flows like water, then piled up and kicked over to achieve the affect of a giant sidestepping through a forest of ghost rabbits and snakes scared for their lives. That's really as succinctly as I can put it.
Beyond the genius use of samples to craft addictions of melody, the impact of Strawberry Jam on the listener is that of an uplifting sermon from a preacher whose religion is unknown to you. The moral is lost, but the message is clear. This is life, and we're living it, so be happy. Be sad. Be equally invigorated by both opportunities. Don't ever forget to scream. "For Reverend Green" illustrates the proper method for expulsion of nervous energy from the system: scream, scream, scream like an angsty teenager in 1994. Scream and let yourself be drowned in waves of sound gathered from dumpsters and backyards, balled up, smoothed out flat, melted into each other and painted across the fronts of ice cream stores and post offices. If Panda Bear's wonderful solo album, Person pitch, is the sound of lazy dreams of fantastic things, then Strawberry Jam is the awakening from that dream to find yourself covered in fire-ants who never bite.
There's only a hint of the sedentary, contemplative Animal Collective of Feels, but similarly missing are the moments of sublime peace. Apart from clips of "#1" and "Cuckoo Cuckoo," these songs are energetic; even when they're slow, they're antsy. Person Pitch seems to have been the outlet for the impulses that drive the band's longer songs, such as "The Purple Bottle." But the absence of tracks that bloom over time is not missed. The vocals are front and center, stealing your attention and never letting go. Panda Bear and Avey Tare don't bother with ambiguity this time around, delivering lyrics that are, for the first time, intelligible. Lines like "When I feel like I'm stealing I can keep myself from hearing God/
I need the taste that you're cooking could make me bow on the ground" touch with an almost accidental innocence upon some deep truth that I don't think I'll ever understand, but it gives me goosebumps anyway. It's the wide-eyed sense of wonder at everything that makes the world go round permeating this album that makes it such a satisfying listen. If there's irony here, it must be buried as deep as the guitars, because I don't see a trace of it.