Animal Collective

Animal Collective biography

Animal Collective is an experimental psychedelic band originally from Baltimore, Maryland, currently based in New York City and Lisbon. Animal Collective consists of Avey Tare (David Portner), Panda Bear (Noah Lennox), Deakin (Josh Dibb), and Geologist (Brian Weitz). Records released under the name Animal Collective may include contributions from any or all of these members; the lineup is not uniform. The band members met in school and started recording together in various forms of collaboration from a young age. The group also runs the record label Paw Tracks on which they have released their own material as well as that of other artists.

History

Origins

Animal Collective grew out of childhood friendships in Baltimore County. Noah Lennox and Josh Dibb met in the second grade at the Park School of Baltimore and became good friends. Lennox went away to a Waldorf high school in Pennsylvania, while Dibb attended The Park School of Baltimore, that David Portner attended since grade school. Brian Weitz moved from Philadelphia to Baltimore County in 1993, attended the same school and became friends with Portner. Weitz and Portner started playing music together when they were 15 because of their shared love of the band Pavement and horror movies. Their musical range included cover songs by Pavement and The Cure as well as the songs "Poison" by Bell Biv DeVoe and "Seasons In The Sun" by Terry Jacks. When both met Dibb later in High School, they started an indie rock band called Automine with schoolmates Brendan Fowler (a.k.a. BARR) and David Shpritz, being the only ones they knew who wrote own songs. "We once set up a show with four bands-bands that were different formations of us"�, Portner remembered in an Interview with Baltimore City Paper. At that time, the group did not have any contact to the music scene in Baltimore and "was more about the back porch. They are not considered as real music."

In 1995, Automine self-released their first and only record, the 7-inch-single Padington Band. Around that time, they also had their first experiences with psychedelic drugs like LSD and started to improvise while playing music. When Portner was 16, he wrote and performed the song "Penny Dreadfuls" with Automine, which later appeared on the first Animal Collective album Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished.

They started to discover psychedelic and sound music like Noggin as well as Krautrock related bands like Silver Apples and Can. Meanwhile, Dibb had introduced Lennox to Portner and Weitz and the four of them played music in different combinations and often solo, producing lots of home recordings, swapping them and sharing ideas. Using a drum machine for the first time, Weitz and Portner started a duo called Wendy Darling, whose sound was inspired by soundtracks of horror movies like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Shining, especially György Ligeti and Krzysztof Penderecki. Portner remembers:

Biography from , the free encyclopedia.
It may not have been reviewed by a professional editor, and recent changes may not show up straight away. See the latest version of this article. Used under licence. Subject to disclaimers.