“Mine is just a way of being.”

Though the individual members of Animal Collective have always released projects on the side, and usually you can distinguish the contributor of certain elements to their songs, this is the first time they deliberately put solo songs on an AC record and called attention to it, sort of like The Beatles did on The White Album. But this isn’t The White Album, and AnCo ain’t The Beatles; it’s a cassette only release that was bundled with shoes designed by the band. As such, this cobbled together effort is lackluster, and not on a level with their previous in-between-albums EPs.

Geologist and Avey Tare’s tracks are both unremarkable, demo-like sketches that seem to have been pulled out of a dusty closet. Avey’s sounds like a Danse-era track, with vocals intentionally low in the mix, though it never gets as abrasive as the worst of that dreadful album.

The usually taciturn Deakin offers up a strong effort on ‘Country Report’, a song that is worth listening to more than once (a strong recommendation after the first two stinkers). Panda Bear’s track, ‘The Preakness’, was taken from his sessions for Tomboy (and was included on the deluxe version of that album), and it does indeed sound like a more polished song than the others. It’s a solid Panda tune, for sure.

The EP certainly highlights the strengths and weaknesses of each member. Clearly, Geologist is not a songwriter, and Avey Tare is not a producer. Panda Bear is good at both, while Deakin shows signs of being a decent songwriter. I think the EP may shed some light on how important Deakin is to the band’s overall sound, even though he often yields the spotlight to Avey Tare and Panda Bear. I don’t know if there is a large subsection of AC fans that were unaware of the members’ solo work (some of which is fantastic and on par with AC’s best), but if they were trying to bring awareness to those projects, this was not the way to do it.

Favorite Tracks: Country Report.