Saturday afternoon on my way out the door, I did a quick twitter search on ANIMAL COLLECTIVE and I noted a few
things: the lines were forming early and getting long, people should
just say marijuana since their code words are more conspicuous, and,
judging by posts on twitter, the crowd may turn out to be fuckwits. My
last suspicion came from this gem posted Saturday evening 5:24pm, and
please note username: HopefulHumanist: "On line for
Animal Collective... Totally cut like half the line ^_^" That's with a
hand crafted emoticon. Way to go, Hopeful Humanist.
Prospect Park shows are generally free or REALLY affordable. For
example, the big summer-opener at the Bandshell this year was David
Byrne Free. Animal Collective? $30. I balked. (THIRTY?!? It's
Prospect PARK, you assholes - even David Byrne played here free. Don't
you LIVE in Brooklyn?) I did a little research and see the MGMT
charged $30 dollars, too. Fine. Animal Collective DID do one nice
neighborhoody thing- AC band members DJed an afterparty at the Bellhouse
with free admission to ticket stub holders, but I'm guessing most had to be
home before bedtime.
I walked up to the park. While the rest of the world suffered the
blight of August at 100 degrees, the happy fans (aww, that IS baby
fat,) appeared entirely unaffected. They poured out in a stream from
the F train staircase and giggled their way to the Park Entrance immune to the wet heat by what I gathered to be a pleasant intoxication. AC fans are happy
people, I though to myself (again, aww). That got ugly later in the
evening when a good portion of the youngsters misjudged the amount of
things they can manage in one night of play.
Enjoying a dizzying peak of indy cred and local fame, the musicians of Animal Collective, Avey Tare (David Portner), Panda Bear (Noah Lennox, and also, I don't know about you, but I kinda wanna punch this guy for that nickname), Deakin (Josh Dibb) and Geologist
(Brian Weitz) put on a show that, judging by the crowd's reaction, delighted and delivered. Wheeling a giant shark to the stage sparked a
firestorm of cheers and
applause in a hazey smog of dope smoke, axe for men and puberty. Fans
swooned to the endless output of sound. During the Saturday night
performance Ryan from Indy Giant PitchforkMedia, tweeted "Encore
blowing minds.
Just played Comfy in Nautica. Best band EVAR?"
I don't know Ryan, I don't know. If by EVAR you mean not in my
reality, then yes. They suck. They have a parking lot full of soft drugs and fourteen year olds, and since the Dead and Phish don't tour regularly, they'll be propped up until the next noodling swath of endless sound gush that passes for music usurps their narcotic ticket sales foundation.
This chestnut I pulled from the comments section on Brooklynvegan sums it up:
What's fifty-feet long with no pubes?
The front row at an Animal Collective show.
Posted by Regular reader | August 16, 2009 12:55 PM
http://www.brooklynvegan.com/archives/2009/08/animal_collecti_23.html
