Animal Collective
Oddsac (Plexi Film)
How do you follow an album that more or less swept the board in last year’s best of 2009 roundups – although to be fair this is actually the culmination of four years’ work between the quartet and director Danny Perez? How about a film, because we all know how well that worked out for Neil Young and The Flaming Lips don’t we? Described recently by the bands Panda Bear as ‘an attempt to capture what the listener might see if they close their eyes while listening to Animal Collective’ the results do leave you fearing for the sanity of the Collective’s audience but then surely no-one really expected any sort of narrative flow, plot or perspective from these guys. That said, and unlike the efforts mentioned above, this film actually works very well (although little of the soundtrack would be suitable listening shorn of the visuals), and ranges from the hypnotic to the downright disturbing (remind me never to go camping in a dark forest and toast marshmallows), in fact it’s not at all dissimilar to much of the Residents better output. Lord only knows what the deuce it all means but it’s an entertaining, if occasionally disconcerting, way to spend an hour.
