Mike's essay on Animal Collective for Village Voice Media is likely the most tantalizing thing I'm likely to read about a band I don't like, and, really, I disagree with most of his conclusions; he should have been more careful about statements like "They've exposed the young white world to dub, South American, and African styles." Subsequent conversations revealed that he, to his embarrassment, meant the Pitchfork generation(the Internet version has since purged this sentence). But the thought stands.

As for yours truly, the obscurity of the lyrics doesn't jive with the moves towards greater openness and focus in the music and singing. Something is being signified, but what? The words half-articulate a joy the band hasn't deeply considered; marriage is a state, the band argues, that reduces late twentysomethings into apostles blessed with Pentecostal fire, without the attendant clarity of expression. It's like holy love turned its supplicants into graceless fools. If lyrics like "I'm really lost in your curls" sung by a twentysomething male is your idea of an endearment, have at it. Plenty of eighteen-year-olds are happily married.