"Here for a while I will fall" (Painting With Animal Collective)

Painting With Animal Collective

Why you'll love it:  Appropriately druggy 

Why you'll hate it: The most "safe" and  least interesting AC has ever been

Never thought I'd be saying this about Animal Collective... I've been coming back to this release every few days for the last couple months, and still ending up with very little to reflect on.

Animal Collective is the kind of band that sounds the best when it seems like they're working against your best interests.  It took them a while to get it right, but there is usually this lightbulb moment with their music where everything suddenly clicks and you realize this isn't artsy nonsense, but catchy pop music using a very unorthodox toolset.

Painting With... is a deliberate attempt to be more straightforward, and here is where the problems begin.  Avery Tare gives his vocals a rest, and lets pitch shifters do most of the work for him.  It's amazing how much luster is lost without Avery putting a little bit of umph into his performance.  He just seems to be drifting from one song to the next, leaving the bells & whistles to give the songs personality.

They don't.

The soundscape of Painting With... is shockingly shallow and repetitive.  A lot of cartoon like boings and bloops litter the tracks with no real point.  All the variation in the vocals is left to pitch shifting that feels just as random.  The songs just flat out aren't interesting, they are performed with little emotion, and all the effects just seem to be splashed into the mix.

Painting With... has few highlights.  "FloriDada" kicks the album off with a promise that goes on unfulfilled.  It's a goofy fun bouncy track.  Nothing amazing for AC but welcome change of pace from their usual tone, and one of the only songs sung with a shred of enthusiasm.  No song seems to play along with the bouncy cartoony soundscape like "FloriDada" does.  I especially like the well timed (and well edited) use of the "ahahahahahhaa wipeout" sample.  "Burglars" is the only other track I can recommend, dude to the Micro-Machines Guy like speedy delivery of the lyrics.  Once again, just a little bit of effort into singing goes a long way.

There are a few songs that grab my attention for a moment.  "Bagels in Kiev" starts off okay, but goes nowhere.  "Golden Gal" has a memorable chorus, but it seems like a waste of talent for AC to be writing joke songs.

Everything else is depressingly forgettable.  In the past year, Animal Collective has gone from a band that I thought was untouchable in the studio and unwatchable live, to the complete opposite thanks to this stinker and the fantastic 2015 release, Live @ 9:30.  Sometimes Animal Collective takes you on a long trip that goes nowhere but at least feels epic and important.  Other times they sound like the most horrifying drug trip ever, abut damn if it isn't memorable.  On Painting With... it just feels like they're asking you if you've ever seen a 20 dollar bill... on weeeeeeed?