The Complexity of Animal Collective's Film ODDSAC

There are few bands that have withstood the corporate mechanization of the music industry and survived to release albums worth a second listen. Animal Collective, since it's inception as an allusive medley of young intellectuals has fascinated audiences with their intricate symphonies often dubbed "noise collage" by music critics. Yet, they are more than mere "noise". They are the epitome of psychedelia in the modern world; a confluence of both the horror and the beauty of the universe and the people in it. From "Here Comes the Indian" to "Feels" & "Strawberry Jam", their sounds range from psychedelic horror rock to upbeat organic drumming and chanting centered on unity and choral euphony. Yet, each song is a complicated arrangement of both vocal harmony/discord and instrumental combinations only musicians with very open minds would attempt. The result is lyric after lyric of deep psyche exploration through the intricacy of emotion to creating feelings which well up unexpectedly and palpably within the listener. The layering of seemingly innocuous tapping and drumming, shaking and smashing results in a wondrous blend of various tones that resonate within the mind and body.

Lucky for the psychedelically-inclined, Animal Collective released what they have described as a "visual album" called Oddsac, directed by Danny Perez. After knowing and loving Animal Collective's sound and message, Oddsac emerges as a culminating piece of art that is, in the least, difficult to erase from one's memory. The Animal Collective's work has always been political in nature and incendiary regarding societal preconceptions and rigidity, challenging norms and exposing the underbelly of our sick, modern world. Oddsac is truly a bizarre jewel among art films in this regard, dealing with ridiculously complex themes. And by ridiculous I mean both silly and philosophical, at times esoteric, and others profound. Let's just say there are both marshmallows and vampires present in the film, but also... demons, trapped females, wasted youth and the infinite mystery and beauty of nature. The film opens with a multifaceted scene involving a shimmering red demon and a melancholic, scared woman attempting to stop a deluge of ink/oil into her tiny home. However, it is not so easy to pinpoint the reasons for each scene, nor the meaning of them. It is wonderfully (and terrifyingly) psychedelic in the sense that a particular scene can conjure up many explanations, feelings, and implications that flow together. Rape, the degradation of society, nature and the dying "hippie" generation intermingle in the same dark, yet boisterously colorful landscape of invented characters and beings.

Film can be utilized to achieve incredible feats of visual and auditory awe. Images which could never have existed can be created with the illusions of cinema, and areas of the human psyche can be portrayed artistically to shock, comfort and amaze the audience. But, Animal Collective has taken it a step further by completely deconstructing any sense of organization or form to blast the mental landscape with totally new concepts and ideas. For around 6 minutes, abstract fuzzy, fizzling, popping shapes obscure the screen and draw one into the screen hypnotically. Then flaming wheels, viscous black flowing liquids and convulsing figures converge as the shots are layered to create visual confusion... and symmetry! It is as if Animal Collective wants us to abandon our preconceptions to embrace total chaos in order to discover the underlying order. This, I feel, very successfully demonstrates the nature of the psychedelic experience, and is a very good tool to opening or expanding one's consciousness. I suggest anyone with an open-mind, a sensitive heart and a curious appetite to watch Animal Collective's Oddsac and venture a dissection of it's themes. It is quite a repulsive feast of the senses to behold.

{Some lyrics from Animal Collective's "Screens" from Oddsac}

I'd like to stay with natural things organic as my skin that peels
And not so often enter in to outer space that I can never
Touch, backlit and bite
Fields in a mine to turn it off and to make sure
I keep it real with myself and never let obsessions with connections to an outside source
Be crippling my abilities to breathe and take a step out from my usual places.

Just to make sure I keep it real with my own and never let a tendency to tread in water with no target
Cripple my abilities to ...

Deal with things that scream be careful
Being screens with me behind it
No one's between what I should
And why am I seeing how to do it?
[and singing at the same time]
Why am I seeing screens, why am I
seeings screens, why am I seeing
Screens.