Somehow over the last decade, Animal Collective have morphed from a somewhat abrasive and mysterious cult group into the world's biggest indie band this side of Arcade Fire, and all the while they've maintained a "marriage of psychedelia and fairy-tale imagery" that Pitchfork first used to describe their sound. Coming off their synth-inflected breakthrough, Merriweather Post Pavilion, the band are releasing Centipede Hz on September 4th. But tonight, you can stream the whole thing here during the world premiere of the album.
The band have been hosting Sunday evening radio mixes from each member all month on their website. Tonight, member Geologist will end the series by giving fans a chance to hear the album two weeks early. The show starts at 9 p.m. EST, but the album won't play until after Geo's mix is done. But if you're an Animal Collective fan, you may want to listen to that first anyway, as he explains it:
My show is actually a version of a mix I made for Ben Allen (Centipede Hz Producer) before we went into the studio. He asked us for a list of songs that we might reference in terms of sound and vibe so he could understand how we wanted the album to sound. We put together a list of songs that either encompassed the overall sound and vibe, or just had specific things we liked, such as drums sounds, or vocal effects. Rather than just send him each song, I thought it'd be fun to make transitions in between each track and sequence it out into 4 separate continuous hypothetical LP sides, which is what we were thinking for the sequencing of our album. For the final show of AC Radio we thought it'd be cool to play this inspirational mix and the album back to back.
Based on the first single ("Today's Supernatural"—you can see the music video above), other new tracks ("Honeycomb"/"Gotham") and various interviews the band have been giving, Centipede Hz is going to be a much less immediately poppy affair than MPP. The album is characterized by a dense sound, with a constant barrage of noises and effects battling for your ears. Panda Bear only contributed two songs (the bubbly "Oh Rosie" and "Daily Routine"-esque standout "New Town Burnout"), returning member Deakin one ("Wide-Eyed") and Avey Tare the rest. Listen to non-album single "Honeycomb" below for a taste of what's to come:
