Press Play: Animal Collective

Though it’s not available until February 19th of 2016, the popular experimental electronic group, Animal Collective, recently debuted their upcoming album, Painting With, in an unlikely venue. Travelers passing through the Baltimore-Washington International Airport on Wednesday, November 25th were unknowingly the first to hear the album when the airport agreed to loop it for several hours over their speakers. 

Since this unorthodox premier, the group has released new details about the album including the three different covers available for the deluxe version, the February release date and the first single, “FloriDada”. Other than a recent live album, this is the group’s first full length record in a few years. Three of the four founding members of Animal Collective began working on Painting With in early 2015. When the album is finally released to the public, it will have been over a year in the making. This long production period makes sense when considering the three collaborators, Avey Tare, Panda Bear and Geologist have been quite busy working on side endeavors recently. 

Avey Tare created the psychedelic pop rock group Slasher Flicks in 2014 and has been busy recording and touring North America with them while Geologist and Panda Bear have been releasing solo albums to critical acclaim. Panda Bear, in particular, has done extremely well on the college radio airwaves. His 2015 albums, Panda Bear Meets the Grim Reaper, and Crosswords EP, topped out at numbers 1 and 10 respectively on the top 200 charts. 

Animal Collective formed in 1999 and when Painting With hits shelves, it will be there tenth studio album. They are an experimental, psychedelic electronic pop group who’s sound is quite unique. Their music can be characterized as having electronic drone based tones with vocal harmonies layered on top and are one of those groups that fans will recognize almost immediately. Unfortunately, no one from RSU Radio was in attendance at the Baltimore-Washington airport so all we know of the sound pertaining to the new album is from the first single, “FloriDada”, which is currently spinning here at 91.3. Check it out in the link below. 

“FloriDada” on YouTube.