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Animal Collective are the sort of band that get lots of love from people who take music a bit too seriously. It’s the sort of music that you appreciate rather than listen to, with a sneaking suspicion that these guys were just lucky rather than talented – in the right place at the right time while their peers slogged away experimentally in obscurity. Right?
My thoughts were set straight at their 20th October gig in Skopje, an overwhelmingly immersive experience which made the music at the Skopje Jazz Festival look like playtime in the paddling-pool. So I apologise unreservedly for the above thoughts, which you should consider pre-straightened.
The venue Kastro was decent but small – the promoters had changed it at the last minute, perhaps realising that the crowd wasn’t going to be as large as they’d hoped, although I now realise that some people had travelled from Kosovo – and probably further afield. I’d been surprised to hear that the Collective was playing in Skopje at all – it’s not a big city, not the sort of place you’d expect a large muso crowd to show for a relatively obscure band, but the people who did show were clearly up for the music, even if they weren’t quite sure what to expect.
Include me in that number, because I didn’t expect them to be more like Underworld than Vashti Bunyan. The three touring members (The Geologist, Avey Tare and Panda Bear) lined up left-to-right, bracketed by stacks of electronic equipment and the occasional musical instrument; on the wall behind them, five banks of LED lights hung like meat in a butcher’s. The sound was unholy, relentless, like an artillery bombardment at dawn. Son et lumiere done as sturm und drang. The vocals battle it out with the throbbing bass, the clashing cymbals, the… other vocals.
There are songs in there – I recognise them, sometimes, like bad dreams at breakfast – but the performance is more about creating the necessary atmosphere, the sense of being completely immersed in the world of the collective. It’s not to everybody’s taste; some people are visibly uncomfortable. At the start of the performance, Dusho tells me “I’m not sure I really like their music”; at the end, he mutters “This is madness”.
“At least you don’t have to worry about whether you like their music any more,” I reply, but you can judge for yourself.
Tags: Animal Collective, Kastro, Skopje