Avey Tare – ‘7s’ album review: entering a psychedelic pop rabbit hole
There is no single leader in Animal Collective. It’s right there in the name: Animal Collective. Baltimore’s favourite psychedelic sons are defined by their collaboration, with each member bringing a different sensibility and set of influences to the group’s music. Not every member has to contribute to every project; in fact, albums that feature all four members are rare, and the ebbs and flows of the group’s ideas help make each new project unique. But if there were one member that anchors the band more than anyone else, it would be Dave Portner, better known by his stage name Avey Tare.
Portner formed the first embryonic version of Animal Collective with his childhood friend Noah Lennox, who took the stage name Panda Bear. Together, the duo spearheaded nearly every Animal Collective album and project up to 2018’s Tangerine Reef, when Lennox stepped away for the first time. As it stands, Portner is the only member of the band to appear on every single Animal Collective release, driving the band’s working habits and defining the sound of each record.
So when you listen to Portner’s newest solo album, 7s, it’s understandable if your mind wanders over to his famous day job. Some of the most notable elements of Animal Collective’s sound, namely the potent mix of pop melodies and experimental instrumentation, are extremely present in Portner’s solo work. To the untrained ear, 7s could even play as a sequel to AC’s most recent project, Time Skiffs. It is, and it isn’t: Portner’s musical identity comes through loud and clear on both albums, but 7s is pure, unfiltered Avey Tare, bolstered with a new appreciation for simpler arrangements and more straightforward compositions.
For anyone who gets annoyed at Animal Collective being weird for weirdness’ sake, let 7s be the antidote. Throughout the seven tracks that make up the entire album, Portner unleashes some of his most memorable melodies and some of his clearest lyrics. In fact, for the uninitiated, I would highly recommend using 7s as the future entry point for anyone looking to ease their way into the trippy otherworldly tones of Animal Collective.
But just because this is the most “normal” album in the AC extended universe doesn’t mean that 7s is normal. Backward noises, sprawling ten-minute tracks, and surrealist imagery of jumping into voids and psychedelic swamps aren’t going to be found on “normal” albums. But what Portner truly excels at on 7s is finding a happy medium between exploratory experimentation and traditional pop song structures.
The album’s centrepiece, the nine-and-a-half minute ‘Hey Bog’, is split almost equally into two parts: ambient sonic swirls and surprisingly catchy indie pop. You’ll hear influences of classical Indian music, tape loop electronica, African drum circles, and trip-hop throughout the track, but you’ll also hear the warm tones of surf rock and the soundscapes of new-age music. What’s most astounding about 7s is that Portner doesn’t sound like he’s sacrificing either side of his artistic approach: there’s room for everything on 7s.
Just because the door is open, however, doesn’t mean it always works. After going down the enthralling rabbit hole of ‘Hey Bog’, you’ll need a bit of a greater. Instead, Portner continues to take you through the intensity of the eight-and-a-half minute track ‘Sweeper’s Gin’. It’s not a bad song, but it’s all a bit overwhelming as a listening experience. Fully-immersive ventures are one thing, but inescapably trippy deluges of sound don’t make it easy for casual listeners.
Still, Portner does a superb job of extending an olive branch to people who might not be fully bought into his unique sonic palate. ‘Invisible Darlings’, ‘Lips At Night’, and ‘Neurons’ all have potent pop hooks that are as accessible as they are eclectic. As 7s careens out of the electronic buzz on ‘Neurons’ and into the clanging industrial sounds of ‘Cloud Stop Rest Start’, Avey Tare absconds back into his musical spaceship, shooting off to discover new uncharted lands. When he earnestly expresses his thoughts that “everyone could have that dream”, it’s almost impossible not to get caught up in his singular vision.
On its own, 7s is a highly ambitious record that succeeds in affirming Avey Tare’s position as one of music’s greatest searchers. But when taken in concert with all of his other work, both inside and outside of Animal Collective, 7s stands alongside AC’s crowning achievement, Merriweather Post Pavillion, in terms of welcoming anyone who is interested into the weird and wild world of AC without freaking them out too much. 7s is a psychedelic pill that’s easy to digest – a journey that any amateur or novice can go along with. That doesn’t make it mainstream or conventional at all: it just makes it quintessential Avey Tare.
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