Animal Collective @ Leeds University | 07/09/2016
Support: Rattle | Origin: UK | Genres: Experimental, Percussion
Kicking off the night was a unique female duo, Rattle. Both ladies were behind drum kits, parts of which were thoughtfully divided between the two. One member handled low frequency content with more of the resonant skins coming through & the chain taken off the snare. The other member did not have a bass drum but had high hats, cymbals, cow bell and a tighter, less resonant tuning.
Often starting off with a repeating rhythm and building on that idea, these tracks were full of interesting & sometimes technical rhythms. Rattle's strongest tracks were those which had lyrics (around half of them) because what replaced them elsewhere was some rather static "oohs" and "aahs" which never seemed to move on to a particular melody. Without melody, sometimes Rattle seemed to move in to the realm of free form experimentation in polyrhythm rather than their more structured songs which I think kept more of a connection with the audience.
The sound engineer had a hand in adding some effects to both the drums & vocals. Delay was used perfectly to create dense textures in the more powerful moments and complimented the nice vocal harmonies. The stand-out track of their set was one which had people around me looking at each other in confusion due to a really creative time signature. Something like 11/4 I believe. A problem that rattle had throughout their set though is not quite committing to a certain rhythm or time signature change which at times made it feel a bit sloppy. When they fully committed, got in to the flow of things & tightened up a bit however, the way both members played off each other was really something special.
Headline: Animal Collective | Origin: US | Genres: Electronica, Psychedelic
Animal Collective played below an amazing stage set with modern art, Easter Island style heads looming over them. The lightshow was superb. Lights inside the heads were triggered in time to the music and a psychedelic haze of shapes often covered the entire stage with a burst of swirling colour. It was unfortunate that their diamond shaped formation had Geologist obscuring the drummer with his giant pedalboard stand, but that's a minor complaint. The band played a nice mixture of their experimental pop songs, mainly from their latest album Painting With, with their more ambient and drawn out songs breaking these up.
The majority of these songs flowed in to one another but because of the experimental & noisey nature of a lot of their songs it sometimes felt a bit samey. I think Animal Collective are at their best when they focus on melody, bringing that to the forefront with the synergy between both singers. These are tracks like 'Stumming The Wetch' or 'Golden Gal' from Painting With. Incredibly impressive intertwining vocal lines with occasional vocal harmonies and even more impressive live. Singers Avey Tare & Panda Bear have definitely improved their singing technique massively in a live setting since the album Strawberry Jam where they were a bit shakey.
I have never been sure if Animal Collective's songs would translate well in to a live setting & while the energy & stage presence is all there, there is one element of their music that I feel prevents it from working 100%. That is the dissonance between the sole acoustic instrument (the drum kit) and the other members who are playing synthesisers & sample pads through a giant tangle of pedals & mixers. The drums were often overpowering, even when they weren't meant to be and many sections of songs felt a bit of a mess of crazy electronic sounds and frantic drums.
This isn't to say that I disliked the drums, I actually think it's one of the best elements of Animal Collective. Their drummer has the difficult job of translating the complex and mostly electronic beats of incredibly rhythmically dense tracks like 'The Burglars' and the result is some of the most impressive live drumming I've seen.
I feel the aforementioned rhythms and catchy vocal melodies just need a bit more room to breathe then the live incarnation of Animal Collective can become something less chaotic and give the tracks the focus they often have on record. Animal Collective live kind of reminds me of their very old material which is often too noisy and ambient for my tastes.
What does work very well live is the injection of dynamics in to a lot of songs which can often be a problem for electronica bands on record. This worked perfectly in 'Guy's Eyes' from Merriweather Post Pavillion. After the superb dynamic build up full of a dense concoction of drones and delays, the sharp drop off back to the triplet drum fills broken up by 2 beats of impactful space was the absolute highlight of the evening. Animal Collective's more structured songs are what keeps me invested in this band and while it was great to get lost in their ambient noise experiments this once, it's tracks like 'Guy's Eyes' I would like to hear more of next time.
