Animal Collective, Cut Off Your Hands and Fever Ray

At FASHION, we’re always on the lookout for a good design collab. So when, for their latest album, trippy indie tribe Animal Collective found both inspiration and title—Merriweather Post Pavilion (Domino Records/Outside Music)—in a Frank Gehry-designed building by that name, we felt compelled to love it. Luckily, the Baltimore-based band of odd fellows is (finally) making it easy.

While previous LPs were brilliant in a nerdy, twitchy, difficult way, Pavilion shines with self-assured genius, the sound of endless experimentation gone delightfully right. Since the album came out last week, we’ve woken every morning with the riotous uplift of “In the Flowers,” then humming the washing-machine rhythm of “Summertime Clothes” all the way to work. “Bluish” is the best though—a lo-fi love song that fills your head with winsome, sticky harmonies. No mistake, this is pop architecture that’s built to endure.

New and of note this week is You and I (Speak n Spell/Frenchkiss), the debut full-length album from New Zealand’s Cut Off Your Hands. The stylish, Smiths-lite foursome are already faves on the UK festival circuit and will be crashing Canada’s shores on tour soon. We hope you can dance in Doc Martens.

Also! Because we’ve got a crush on all things Swedish—Acne Jeans, Facehunter, Lykke Li, Ikea, Ikea’s meatballs—we’re getting set to sync our heartbeat to the strange sounds of Fever Ray’s (the solo project of of Karin Dreijer Andersson, one side of Stockholm’s electro-goth duo The Knife) self-titled LP, which promises to be beautiful, yet deeply bone-chilling. Don’t believe us? YouTube “If I Had a Heart,” and then try to fall asleep.

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