Animal Collective - The Forum Theatre, Melbourne (Dec 14)

Have you ever had a sense that you’ve just witnessed a show that a fair portion of the crowd will be talking about in 10 years time? Well upon leaving Melbourne’s premier music venue The Forum, I had that feeling after seeing Animal Collective’s second ever Melbourne show.

In November 2006 Animal Collective first graced Australia on the back of their critically acclaimed 6th Album Feels. On that tour they played a quick run of dates in pub venues along the east coast of Australia. Their return to these shores in December 2009 saw them headline the Meredith Music Festival and play a run of theatre shows around the country with support from New Zealand solo artist Bachelorette. This leap forward is largely due to what critics and fans have called one of 2009’s best albums Merriweather Post Pavilion.

Wandering into the Forum on a Monday night with, post festival blues and trepidation after a lackluster set at Meredith, I was greeted to some lovely layered synth pop tunes from Bachelorette. Watching one of New Zealand’s finest indie stars on the big stage with her psychedelic computer monitors was the perfect warm up to the main act.

Without no introduction or fanfare this trio from Baltimore took the stage, with Noah ‘Panda Bear’ Lennox, Dave ‘Avey Tare’ Portner, and Brian ‘Geologist’ Weitz each taking their spot on the stage with an array of instruments, effects pedals and synths to choose from. Over the course of the next 90 minutes they delved into their back catalogue but not surprisingly leaned heavily upon Merriweather.

Any Animal Collective live show involves reworked, slowed down and extended versions of songs, with Panda Bear and Avey Tare taking care of tribal drum solos and the Geologist (headlight in tow) spending the majority of the show tweaking pedals and working in troughs.

Over the course of the last 10 years they have explored folk, electro, pop, rock, shoe gaze and psychedelica. Vocal looping has become their trademark and Also Frightened was an early highlight of the evening. As was the dub / calypso feel that Chocolate Girl brought to the forum theatre.

A pleasant surprise was a live airing of Comfy in Nautica off Panda Bear’s solo album. The singles from Merriweather were definite crowd pleasers with My Girls and Summertime Clothes with the crowd being whipped into frenzy.

The encore commenced with In Flowers, with the Geologist taking charge with samples of rain and thunder. Before they built the beat into Brother Sport, a song based around African tribal drums and sporadic screaming from Panda Bear, whom if not the mastermind behind this eclectic trio than at least the master in the live format.