ALBUM: Animal Collective – Strawberry Jam

The experimental indie sometimes-four piece’s upcoming album Strawberry Jam is possibly their most accessible record so far, abandoning the abstract soundscapes of their earlier releases for the more straight forward, poppy sound of recent albums Feels and Sung Tongs.

The songs have a melodic quality to them while still maintaining the band’s trademark eclecticism. Singer Avey Tare yelps, yodels and sporadically shouts his way over swirling, electronic backgrounds, helicopter percussions, and all manner of weird and wonderful instrumentation. Catchy vocal lines are doubled with surrealist lyrics (expect jumbled childlike narratives of dinosaur wings, broccoli, warm cereal, and snowmen that never melt).

Overall, the album sounds like a strange collaboration between Architecture in Helsinki, Clouddead and Brian Eno. The album does have it’s flaws; it lacks some of the hyperactive experimentation of earlier Animal Collective releases, and although sounding more controlled, it perhaps plays a bit too smoothly for the listener used to the animal collective’s bazaar album structures.

As upbeat and childlike as ever, Strawberry Jam makes undeniably easier listening than previous releases. Not quite as strange, but rest assured that we won’t be seeing them on MTV just yet.

Strawberry Jam is released 10th September 2007. You can buy it from here