E-Mail This Article to a Friend Sweet emotion Animal Collective hook up with Vashti Bunyan BY NICK SYLVESTER
	Related Links Megan Bell reviews Animal Collective's Sung Tongs Vashti Bunyan's Web site

Here begins the impossible task of convincing this great city of rock — home to Aerosmith and the dudes who wrote "More Than a Feeling" — that the best music in the universe actually comes from the pretentious Maryland-via-Brooklyn outfit called, yes, the Animal Collective. Stacking the deck against themselves, AC members, who headline downstairs at the Middle East this Sunday, also sport stage names like Avey Tare and Panda Bear, wear animal masks in concert, and admit to enjoying walks in the park. It’s possible they don’t even know who the Red Sox are.

Last year, the band’s psych-folk string masterpiece Sung Tongs (Fat Cat) earned them wider recognition and more than a few year-end accolades. But their high profile was somewhat misleading. The mainstream press, eager to sell a scene, heralded them as the New Kings of Folk, the Princes of New Freakfolk, and the Pre-eminent Archons of Folktown, giving Avey and Panda their glossy spreads but forcing them to share their column inches with Devendra Banhart, Joanna Newsom, and sometimes (inexplicably) Espers and White Magic.

AC can folk for sure, but the pigeonholing seems myopic given their history of forward-thinking noise pop (2001’s Spirit They’re Gone, Spirit They’ve Vanished), future-primitivist rhythms (2003’s Here Comes The Indian), and crackly acoustic drones (2003’s Campfire Songs). In fact, the band’s versatility may be their strong point; they aim for genres and moods they haven’t yet mastered, and though the result can be chaotic, it feels complete.

Their forthcoming Prospect Hummer EP (also on Fat Cat, and already cruising file-sharing networks more than a month before its official May 31 release) refines and looks back at their many sounds. It’s a good entry point into their catalogue. And there’s a very special guest: Vashti Bunyan, the late-’60s British songstress whose recently rediscovered work has become a touchstone for folk artists who’ve arrived in the last two years. Bunyan disappeared onto the moors after her 1970 utopian-Britfolk debut, Just a Diamond Day, tanked on arrival. In 2003, she reappeared for "just this one time" collaborations with Piano Magic and Devendra Banhart. But Animal Collective collaborating with Bunyan is like Radiohead collaborating with Pink Floyd.

Three songs came out of their session, each equally submissive to Bunyan’s melodic lead. "It’s You" won’t do much to shake her reputation as a Folk Goddess — harp-like cascades of strings trail her phrases with Legend of Zelda appeal, rejuvenating the listeners her voice leaves weak-kneed. Animal Collective themselves sound a bit bashful, at first choosing to call-and-respond from a distance before chancing intimate harmony, and never disheveling Bunyan’s rubato. But their timidity seems pointed, especially when Panda’s cavernous echo catches up to Bunyan two-thirds of the way through, and the rest of the band join in on a wordless, highlight-reel coda.

If "It’s You" is strictly Animal Collective backing Bunyan, the EP’s title track finds the two parties working more equitably. With its bells-and-whistles stuffing and pre-school whoa-whoa-whoas, "Prospect Hummer" is the song most likely to be dismissed by rock crits as a Sung Tongs B-side. I don’t have a problem with Sung Tongs B-sides, but that’s not what’s happening here. Bunyan’s delivery slows the band’s simple pace to a delicate, unpredictable tiptoe, so you can actually make out this gem of a stanza: "Your cat is a friendly bother/Who’d offer his heart in allegiance/And if he could talk we’d be best friends/The only friend he has is his food." Whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa-wah.

It wouldn’t be an Animal Collective record, though, if it didn’t include something seemingly gratuitous, and on Prospect Hummer, this wild-card role is filled by a five-minute acoustic drone collage that AC’s Geologist, who was not involved in the Bunyan session, assembled late in 2004. Since the track consumes nearly a third of the disc’s run time, it’s a potential drag for the pop set. But give these guys the benefit of the doubt. Much like "Visiting Friends" on Sung Tongs, the drone provides the album its only dark space, enveloping the other songs with its thick, crickety fog. If you have to, write it off as the sound of their sweet emotion.

Animal Collective perform this Sunday, April 17, downstairs at the Middle East, 480 Massachusetts Avenue in Central Square; call (617) 864-EAST.