Experiencing Animal Collective for the first time "Time Skiffs 

This album is honestly a great place to start for someone who has never heard any animal collective, IMO it's their most accessible. It'd be interesting to get your take on strawberry jam, seeing you in a kid's room is kind of funny because a lot of their themes (especially on SJ) are about adolescence.

I highly highly highly recommend Sung Tongs, Feels, and Strawberry Jam. These are personally the Anco albums I resonate with the most and consider them to be what makes this album a return to form but in a much more mature way.

Funny you mention greatful dead - animal collective were the first band to legally license a greatful dead song, its in the chorus of "What would I want? Sky" off of their "Fall Be Kind" EP

“Experimentaling” is someone who is just beginning to experiment. A “fledgling experimentalist”. Maybe it should be a word, eh?

Great review prof! I'd totally recommend seeing them live if you get the chance, I went to their show in Asheville last year and they killed it. They don't tour that much with all four members though so if you get the chance to see them all together, take it. I'd also recommend listening to their EP Fall Be Kind, especially the song I Think I Can, if you were left wanting more vocal harmonies. Hope you get well soon and don't have covid

go check every album they made in the 00’s. you’re in for a big big trip, they were truly on another level.

i'm SO glad you touched on TMBG. those first 4 albums are criminally underrated because they are silly. very cool, very cool. feel better, prof.

First video I've seen from you. You got a new subscriber, great format and I couldn't stop hearing the Dead too!

Feels and Spirit they’ve gone spirit they’ve vanished are masterpieces. Hope you’re able to listen to them soon.

Really nice video! Fun to see that you did some research on the band beforehand!

Excellent review, i hope you feel better soon. I recommend Feels or Sung Tongs after Time Skiffs. In my view Feels is the most similar, in spirit, to Time Skiffs.

Professor, Please check out Cities Aviv’s latest record “MAN PLAYS THE HORN”. It’s truly incredible. He’s in a similar lane as MF Doom and Earl Sweatshirt and others that get broadly grouped into the underground/abstract/lofi hip hop sound. Very experimental, but quality music and I’d love to hear what you have to say about it.

I had covid last month and I have young kids so they are always in your face. It is so hard to separate from the ones you love. I'm sending good vibes your way. Hope everyone is well soon!

Triples is always safe lmao love your content and super happy to hear this quote 🖤

It’s so fascinating hearing someone whose first experience of Animal Collective is this. To me, this album feels like an epilogue to their career- not one of the ‘core albums’; you could understand Animal Collective without it. So, seeing how you can come to understand Animal Collective using ONLY this is fascinating. It’s like if your first exposure to Bob Dylan was Tempest.

i really really love this channel...

Also I do believe it’s a little bit of a miss characterization to say that Brian (Geologist,) just does sound effects. Sure that has tended to be his main role in the past, but in recent years he has started contributing synthesizer and on this album in particular plays the hurdy-gurdy. It’s also a miss characterization because all of the members of the band are involved with sound design. For example, they have a song called Peacebone and that’s the beginning of the song there is this strange pig sample. That was actually a sound given to geologist by Noah (Panda Bear,) to use as a texture in that particular piece.

Right on! My (fairly unproductive) comment got cited in a Professor Skye video.

Get well soon Professor ❤️

high praise for that Lego Movie poster, I don't know anything about Animal Collective but hearing you talking about it is certainly interesting

Make sure you check out Strawberry Jam during a lull in New music releases this year!

This album is very different than the other AC albums. Geologist (Brian Weitz) went to Columbia and earned a Master's, I think in Marine Biology fyi. He worked in the Capitol as an enviro-lobbyist I believe, or their office to some capacity. Anyway, their discography is massive and extremely varied--they sound like a different band with every release. I recommend exploring all of it over time. Everyone has a different favorite record, mine is Painting with but most people dislike that one. Most people will tell you that Feels, Merriweather Post Pavilion, Strawberry Jam, Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished, or Song Tongs are the best ones, great stuff! Centipede Hz and Ark are noisey and intense, but brilliant. Also their solo records are great: person pitch, sleep cycle, cows on Hourglass Pond, down there, Tomboy, Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks..I could go on and on. Their EPs are just as good as their albums. U can't judge the band on just a couple of albums, not that u are attempting to do that anyway. Get well soon dude

Was great to hear your thoughts as an AnCo virgin! I hope you check out some of their other work. I think this album has them sounding most like a typical 'band' compared to a lot their other albums (clearly separated drums, bass, guitar etc). Glad you enjoyed Panda's drumming! I think he's an underrated drummer, but the drums aren't always so prominent as on here. My fave picks are Strawberry Jam and Feels. Panda's Person Pitch is incredible too though, hugely psychedelic, but in an unconventional way.

THANK Y0U PROFESSOR SKYE!!!

Nice I think you should leave reference at the start lol

tare weight hahaha-- this was a great discussion on this record. ive seen some other people reccommending Strawberry Jam, which is kinda like this record but more spastic, wide-eyed, and freakish. ill rec it too :)

My God, I've been a huge fan of both Animal Collective and They Might Be Giants for so long, and I often make these types of connections between bands I like, it's embarrassing that I never noticed the vocal similarities. Although I think it's limited to Noah (Panda Bear) and Flansburgh from TMBG.

I wouldn't say that other Animal Collective albums are as accessible as Time Skiffs. Time Skiffs is easy on the ears and very focused, without too much repetition. Merriweather Post Pavillon, Strawberry Jam and Feels are the most well-received. However, you'll need a bit of patience to sit through them. This is why I wholeheartedly recommend EPs! Prospect Hummer, People, Fall be Kind and Water Curses are short & sweet.

if you like the harmony and layering of this album, please please please check out their 2009 album merriweather post pavillion, their most popular album and my favorite as well

First time listening to anco? If you liked this album I recommend Feels, Strawberry Jam, Merriweather Post Pavilion and Spirit They're Gone Spirit They've Vanished

any plans on doing the new saba record? his last album is my favourite project ever and I would love to hear your thoughts on his artistry

Nice room.

this is definitely the best album for someone to get into animal collective, a little more mainstream than most and just the right about of experimenting. I would highly recommend Strawberry Jam if you like their more experimental side, and Painting With if you want something a little more mainstream

Panda Bear’s album is Person Pitch!!! It’ll change your life! Review that!!!

The first time and this album?!

I'd love to hear your thoughts on their new album, Isn't It Now?

They're really jammy on concert tho

I recommend listening to their other albums. I know you say stuff about profundity in ignorance, but for real though. This is definitely their most Grateful Dead-ish album. Merriweather Post Pavilion (electronic pop psychedelia), Sung Tongs (acoustic guitar psychedelia, probably my favorite, holy shit at least listen to this one even though I recommend going in the order I've put in this comment), Feels (experimental rock), Spirit They've Gone Spirit They've Vanished (noise pop/rock), Strawberry Jam(experimental pop), Ark (experimental/ambient/minimal/noise).... I mean damn, so many incredibly different and amazing albums under their belt.

How do I get into Grateful Dead? Album to start with?

Animal Collective has always existed outside of any of the limitations of scene, genre, and some extent cultural relevance. Cultural relevance you might ask? Sure. I just don’t know any other band who so willingly blends such obvious child like naïveté with lyrical subject matter that has such wide reaching references across this vast experience of living life. In any event it was these particular elements that initially drew me to them when I first heard their music way back in 2005. They have always had those through lines of their vari idiosyncratic approach to psychedelia. primitive percussion, vocal harmonies, dense sonic layering, just to name a few. So I have to admit I really don’t understand people who would say something like “this is late period Animal collective,“ when have they ever been a band that stands still? I love Merriweather Post Pavilion. It’s a modern psychedelic pop masterpiece. But anyone who thought that the group had settled into a groove after releasing that album and it’s a company in EP was most likely unfamiliar with the precedent that had been set by this band for the previous nine years. Or at the very least, they definitely didn’t consider it when making bets about the future of the band. Centipede HZ should have been no surprise and only continues the bands restless individualist approach to making music. Although there fearless sonic expiration may have brought them into the limelight for a short window of time, anyone who knows the band knew that they probably weren’t going to stay there, and that some sharp left turns were eminent. I don’t mean to sound like a gatekeeper, I’m definitely not one of those people who would be condescending towards those who only found a Animal Collective after MPP, but as someone who is very committed to taking a bands artistic evolution within the context of their history and prevailing artistic philosophies, I’m not sure why so many people were so thrown off by post 2009 AC. All of this stuff aside though, I honestly think that Time Skiffs is top-tier animal collective. In my opinion this might be their best album. If not at least in their top three. It’s mature, refined, reflective of where they are as people. It offers something aesthetically familiar, while boldly embracing novel and interesting sonic ideas At least, in the context of their catalog.

What biography are you talking about for AnCo?

You need to listen to Marriweather Post Pavillion, their 2009 peak

Experimentaling, is when someone not only experiments, but experiments with a "experimental" mindset. What does that mean? I don't know but it kinda makes sense to me

Skye you should check out the album Valentine by Snail Mail. As a fan or female led pop I think you’ll find it engaging.

OMG

They peaked with Merriweather Post Pavilion, so you might wanna start from there..

Been listening to this album this morning and really like it. I’m a bit partial to psychedelic music. I do have a question though. Why does it seem that Gen X bands and music fans seem so enamored by The Beach Boys ? And don’t tell me it’s because they’re a great band, which I know they are. It seems to be something more than that.

Listen to Feels! Jesus.

Sorry about the Billie Eilish heartbreak, Prof.

You are LEONARD RIGHT

My favorite band of all time, Merriweather Post Pavilion was so good it took them over a decade to make another good album, this is it!

I could never get into this band

Bad entry point, great great great band. The record (Time Skiffs) is also much much better live imo.

Stopped listening. I’m 40 in a week. You had a lot of good things to say about some other things, but you’re coming to a late Animal Collective album for your intro to them? Listen to Feels. Panda Bear changed my life with Person Pitch. You know nothing. They’re MASTERPIECES.