ex ex ex change!
April 1st, 2008
Panda Bear of Animal Collective released a solo album last year that hit the top ten in many many critics’ best of 2007 lists. And the album is kind of great…all Beach Boys gone psychedelic freak-out but still sunshine-y. I especially love the first track, Comfy In Nautica…it’s like a weird gentle industrial-style rhythm with a Brian Wilson sunshine vocal, I love it…
I saw Animal Collective in a tiny DC venue, The Warehouse Next Door…I only went to the show because an old high school friend of mine was in the opening band, Antelope (they’re on Dischord, neat-o). Antelope and Animal Collective — nice, right? Anyway, Antelope were pretty good, but Animal Collective blew the lid off, all yelping and mask-wearing. In the middle of their set my high school pal leans over and says "Pretty fresh, huh?" and it had been ages since I’d heard "fresh" used. Since then I’ve been using it liberally.
Fresh is a great word for this remix of Comfy In Nautica that I came across over at the fantastic blog Analog Giant. The Giant posts liberally, and even the tracks I’m not that into are still interesting. This remix is done by XXXchange of Spank Rock. I’m sure he pronounces his name "triple x change," but I like to imagine him pronouncing it "ex ex ex change." I don’t know much about Spank Rock, except for the Baltimore guys make good! angle. I’ve hung out with some people who went to school with the MC, Naeem, and say that he used to be this total geek, and how amazing it is that now he’s this feted MC.
Anyway, XXXchange’s remix shoots an already great song into the stratosphere…I’m listening to it on repeat!
Panda Bear – Comfy In Nautica (xxxchange remix)
[audio:Comfy_xxxchange_remix.mp3](If you care, you can stream an Antelope track at Dischord’s download page here.)
oh good gravy, I LOVE that Panda Bear record and the crazy orgy in a bathtub about to break out cover art. My g5 big rig got serious overlapping extent errors in my quartzcore last week or so and that record helped keep me from having a stroke.
I read a great review of that record where the reviewer said something like “I can just imagine Panda Bear getting some sound and then lovingly shifting it and shaping, twisting it and totally deconstructing it until finally he says That’s it! that’s how I want it to sound!”
I love that image. That album is so sunshine-y to me; I know the Brian Wilson ref is played out, but it’s also so appropriate here…
bring on the sun!
also I love the phrase “good gravy”, nice work