The Fat Cat double-disc reissue job of Spirit They've Gone, Spirit
They've Vanished and Danse Manatee delivered Avey Tare & Panda Bear to
the world, tied up in a pretty ribbon bow, a packaged-up package that
let them, and friends Geologist and Conrad Deakin, be known hereon out
as Animal Collective, a far less confusing handle for those only
following along casually at home. The first disc in such a set was
actually just a collaboration between the two, but the second roped in
Geologist (hence the need to collectivize if delivering both discs as
work of singular artist); and, then, by last year's Here Comes the
Indian, they were all convening as an ad-hoc quartet under the
collective umbrella nomenclature. In between these Animal missives,
though, was an on-the-side moment that slipped through cracks it shoulda
filled, the duo going back to duo mode under the name Campfire Songs,
recording on a porch(!) in acousticky tones that showed their
wonky-psych shtick could work in the out-of-doors. Before that, with
some irony, it was hard to imagine these Animal-loving folkies as
existing anywhere outside some locked-in bedroom billowing with a hazy
haze of bong-smoke, such insular environs the only breeding-ground in
which they could cultivate their cockeyed Syd Barrettesque fantasias.
And, now, the stoked warmth of the Campfire still flickers on this
latest entry into their scattershot discography. Sung Tongs
is the first primed-for-big-things record for Avey Tare & Panda Bear, returning under the Animal Collective banner, but again recording just as a duo; it
already has a readymade audience in wait, and all. And, early on, it
finds the duo in strangely pop-like mode, getting all strummy and
summery as three of the first four cuts — "Leaf House," "Who Could Win a
Rabbit," and "Winters Love" — stir up melody and rhythm and a rhythmic
sway they claim was influenced by Tropicalist kings Caetano Veloso and
João Gilberto. Whilst there were faux-flamenco-ish strums bust out as
part of their Campfire Songs, the last time the pair really got this
knee-deep in Brazillification was when they were hanging with Arto
Lindsay way back in the day when they were no-name cats with silly
names. These songs, on opening, introduce Sung Tongs as being a huge
step forward in these Animals' evolutionary progress. As it progresses,
the disc doesn't entirely do without the free-form fumblings and hissy
haze, "Visiting Friends," notably, meandering through 13 minutes
of implied music. But, then, immediately things pick up, the 50-second
Wilsonically-harmonized salvo-against-further-education "College" (total
lyrics: "You don't have to go to college") leading into the exuberant
percussion-thumping "We Tigers," which dances through a jungle book
scribbled in cave-painted primitivism. By the time the longplayer
finishes playing, you realize, whilst the acoustic guitars and
harmonized vocals and that awesome table-tennis-ball-bouncing-beat
may've made you think this was some easy-to-love pop platter, it
actually hasn't stumbled all the way towards getting-it-together.
Still, Avey Tare & Panda Bear go halfway there; and, with listeners only
needing to meet them at such a musical halfway, Sung Tongs looks like it
could easily be another strange success in outsider-folk's unlikely
ascension in popularity.
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