Although radio doesn’t carry with it the same sense of collective listening it once did—there’s just too many other platforms out there vying for our attention—everyone who was around to listen to it before the internet stole our hearts and minds and lolz will have some fond memories of what it can do. Namely, enlightening your ears and mind to sounds and audio you may not have encountered before.
This sense of unexpected discovery and exploration was the idea behind the Animal Collective Radio station that was launched by the band, in collaboration with The Creators Project, last year to countdown the release of their album Centipede Hz. The weekly show featured different band members and guests playing mixes, while exploring the creative influences on Centipede Hz, and also invited listeners to participate by creating their own mixes of the show.
The final instalment streamed the album along with custom visuals for each track by artist Abby Portner. Portner, who dubs herself the “visual person” for Animal Collective, has been creating images to go with their sounds since they started their sonic experiments back in 2000. For the new album cover and tour poster she thought up the concept of an alien radio transmission—this resulted in the motif of a mouth speaking from another world which became the unifying image throughout the artwork.
This translated over to the live show as a giant mouth stage set which contained the band and their equipment and cropped up in the videos—the same ones shown on the radio show—with Portner rotoscoping a mouth over other visuals to created a layered, hallucinatory vision of the band’s sounds. In the live shows the videos became tour visuals with the motion of the animations based on the cadence of the songs.
And now you can experience this prismatic audiovisual spectacle for yourself with the release of three live videos of tracks “Applesauce”, “Amanita”, and “Moonjock”. As well as enjoying the band’s multilayered sonic imaginings and the richly realized stage set, the performance is further augmented by Portner’s collaged visuals that erupt across the screen like psychedelic lens flare.
You can watch all three videos below:
“Applesauce”
“Amanita”
“Moonjock”
WINCONCERTTICKETS
We’re giving away two tickets to select shows on Animal Collective’s Centipede Hz Tour. Plus a limited number of entrants will also receive the 10" single for “Applesauce” and a complimentary tour poster. To find out how to win go here.
Photo credit: Dave Lichterman
If you want to experience the live show for yourself, you can catch the band on tour at the following dates and venues:
03-07 Boston, MA – House of Blues Boston
03-08 Montreal, QC – Metropolis
03-09 Toronto, ON – Danforth Music Hall
03-11 Cleveland, OH – House of Blues Cleveland
03-12 Covington, KY – The Madison Theater
03-13 Nashville, TN – Marathon Music Works
03-15 Royal Oak, MI – Royal Oak Music Hall
03-16 Chicago, IL – Riviera Theatre
03-17 Madison, WI – Orpheum Theatre Madison
03-18 Minneapolis, WI – First Avenue
03-20 St. Louis, MO – The Pageant
03-21 Kansas City, MO – Midland Theatre
03-22 Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre
03-23 Salt Lake City, UT – The Depot
03-24 Boise, ID – Treefort Music Fest