Musical Note: My Girls

A song you might like.

I’ve been guiltily buying Animal Collective albums for a while now, and it has taken me a long time to fall hard. I’ve come close. “Grass,” from the album Feels, is beautiful, jangly, and short. Short is important. I have a harder time processing longer tracks, which could be why it’s taken me a long time to digest the Animal Collective discography. At the urging of a friend, I recently played “My Girls,” from the most celebrated album of the year, really loud. And that did it. The hand-claps! These songs are meant to be played really loud. For me, Toto’s “Africa” is the perfect pop song. This comes close. There is a part of me that feels very guilty about praising a song that’s been so widely praised, particularly for a savvy audience like this one. Yet it had to be done. If this is what neo-primitivism sounds like, sign me up. No ritual scarring, please.