“If it’s hard for the average record to seem necessary in a world of music on tap, one of the best illusions a musician can conjure is the sense that they’re driven by some other or greater impulse — that they’re tapping into some energy that exists totally outside the world of their making it and your listening to it. I do not, for the record, believe that Animal Collective are actually driven by anything so much grander than any other band; most all musicians strive for that vitality. It’s just that the sound of Animal Collective’s music has been remarkably good at signifying that “greater impulse.”
I guess I’m resigned to chalk up my general lack of enthusiasm about AnCo’s music to this feature of their music that Abebe points out. This “otherness” and “greater impulse” apparently sounds to others like divine inspiration, but it has always sounded to me much more alienating and almost condescending at times.
I’m glad to hear that Nitsuh Abebe, (one of the best, for real) thinks that this “otherwordly energy” is a purposeful illusion, at least.
My affliction, apparently, is that I like music I can live in. I’ve never seen music as having the same capacity as a novel or film (or other narrative media) to provide me with escapism. I’m pretty fascinated with this world, and I see music (because of its versatility) as the perfect companion and as a tool for trying to understand everything else.
So when music comes along that seems alien, uninhabitable, unrelatable, it’s hard for me to swallow. I feel like it’s trying to eschew something essential about human nature, warp it. I’m uninterested.
- April 12 2011 | 30 Notes - Read More →
