Animal Collective

Strawberry Jam is the Animal Collective release of 2007. It is an LP packed with experimental indie rock music that has lots to offer. 

Highlights: I keep smiling after listening to Fireworks. The song has a very long build-up, with repeatable chord progression. There is such an upbeat feeling about the album that it reminds me of Broken Social Scene due to the sheer amount of volume that the songs take up (the sound is dense, if you want). If we take Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl as an example, the build up in both songs is similar. We are talking about several minutes of escalation only to be followed by an elusive climax. Equally, the track reminds me of Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust, the album by Sigur Rós, with specific reference to the tracks Gobbledigook and Inní mér syngur vitleysingur (the two upbeat tracks of the release). Finally the track has an element of shoegaze over it à la Blonde Redhead's 23. 

I don't know if I would call the release Avant-garde. I would have to know a lot more about music theory to actually tell if the elements of percussion in the track are in any way different from what has been done before. I would, however, say that there is an air of playfulness in the song unlike much of what has been seen before.