The Spirit Carried On.

Part 1

When I was thirteen years old, I used to be really stupid. I still am a lot, but back then, I was really, cartoonishly stupid.

In one ocasion, when I was searching for some videogame related thing, an ancient forum popped up in the front page of google. It wasn't the first time. The strangest thing to me, then, was that all the topics I've come across where made and discussed in 2012.

Thus began a life-long storyline that still haunts me to this day. Before this event, I didn't think about my past and didn't feel it the way I do today. It's like a tangible thing, I can see it, hear it, smell it, almost hold it in my hands, all the time, every single day.

Even though I haven't lived most of the memories that keep passing through me. This feeling would go on to follow me for the rest of my entire life. I call it Nostalgia Overdrive.

If we're talking in music, the best picture I can paint in your mind to describe all this is using Radiohead's Idioteque or Spaceghostpurrp's Friday as an example, but you wouldn't understand what I mean. And honestly, I don't think I could explain it either. Other than those two examples, there is a little album called Spirit They're Gone, Spirit They've Vanished, which perfectly translated my Nostalgia Overdrive experience within sound files.

Spirits (as I will call it from now on) is the most interested I've been on a record ever since I listened to Mount Eerie a while back. But it's a much more personal kind of interest. Mount Eerie shocked me for its immaculateness, its grandiose scope and complete sense of musical whisdom, but Spirit They're Gone interested me even before wanting to hear it.

It all started from the cover art. Sure, I've seen it before lots of times, being the mucore essential, modern cult classic that it is, and it always came across to me as cryptic and mystical in a very specific way.

I encounter myself, once in a while, having weird visions and memories about the late 90s and early 2000s, very specific things like carpets, rockets, a purple guitar, a bedroom with a CRT and a Nintendo Wii, space aesthetics... Something I've been dealing with ever since that episode from when I was 13.

That cover art is the closest to a physical manifestation of this feeling I'll ever have. So, naturally, it got my attention.

But I'm not writing this after listening to the album for the first time, as I do with most of my reviews, since I can usually No, this album took me at least 3 weeks of slowly listening and re-listening to its tracks just to begin to grasp what I thought about it... and I'm still not even sure.

(Edit: I'm re-writing some parts of this review later than those initial 3 weeks. I've listened to the album again more times and have more thoughts about it).

Part 2

My rocky relationship with this records stems from the fact that it is perfect by default. It is me by default. There's this one somewhat obscure post-internet album called Cheer Up Emo Kid by Starsculptor which, ever since my first listen, has been my go-to choice for an album that represents me as a person. Everything I like and the memories I have, it's on there. 

But Spirits represents me in a much deeper way than Cheer Up Emo Kid ever could. Sure, Nostalgia Overdrive plays a big part on it, but as I explore its themes, it speaks to me way more than it did before.

The lyrics are all somewhat cryptically poetic, written in such a way that resemble religious writings, old folklore, or the most complex and emotional fairy tale you can imagine. All about childhood and failing to let go of your past. This is basically what I've been dealing with for years. 

Those themes are conveyed not only through surreal lyrics but specially through surreal sound. More specifically, dissonance. The beautiful verses and shakesperian vocabulary in the opener Spirit They've Vanished are contrasted by a harsh wall of noise, as if to say these feelings are rotting the narrator from the inside even though these memories are too far to reach.

The whimsical feeling of the opener's lyrics give space to grounded lyrics but increasingly mystical sounds, such as the piano and background synth pads in Penny Dreadfuls (my second favorite song in the album). It feels spacious, literally. It feels like I'm floating in space, in an astronaut suit, looking at the earth, like in Mario Kart Wii's Rainbow Road. It brings me much closer to my "anemoian" memories than anything ever did.

When we get to La Rapet, my favorite Animal Collective song overall, things get more criptic, both lyrically and sonically. Despite the innocent surface, I interpret this song as representing a loss of innocence. The lyrics maybe imply something to do with sex, but I'm not sure about that, but they clearly imply severe cognitive dissonance, also portrayed by the moody chords followed by less moody chords. The song ends with one of the most melancholic bits in any song of this caliber I've ever heard. It's a musical journey in the same way U-Rei by Number Girl is: It has a clear beggining, climax, and end.

But even with all that, the album still feels a bit off. As if its beauty and honesty aren't the result of some musical whisdom but just luck. Later works by Animal Collective confirm that in a way, being increasingly less out there and more general alt pop. Spirit They're Gone is just circumstancially great, at least from that point of view.

Despite my rambling here, as I said before, this album is perfect by default. What I mean by this is that it doesn't exactly surprise me in any way. It never gave me something unexpected, it never surpassed my expectations, it just exactly matched my expectations. That's why I can't tell you that I think this is an "outstanding" or "exciting" work of art. It is as perfect as perfect can be, and that's kinda boring.

THE POINT

Usually, I tend to have very strong opinions on things. I can easily tell if I like something or not, why I like it and why I think it's good, but in this case I can tell why I think it's good but I don't understand the extent of my enjoyment of the record.

That feeling I have, the memories that aren't mine, it is there and I appreciate having something that I can point to and show to other people how it feels to me. It feels extremely intimate and personal. But at the same time, I don't like it. I think it's "too much", almost like the musical equivalent of a twitter bookstan who reads 100 books per week and has lost the sense of artistic emotion a long time ago. But that's not to say the album isn't emotional... but it's also not to say it is. You see? It's complicated. 

It's an artistic paradox, it's perfect and at the same time it knows it's better than everyone else, which makes me lose sympathy. It feels personal, but at the same time, owned by everyone.

I feel like I've known this album my whole life, but I'm not sure I like it. I'm not even sure I remember meeting it. Were we best friends at some point? Did I have a crush on it? Did I listen to The Smashing Pumpkins with it at the top of a building? I can't tell. It is telling me all these things, but the memories are too blurry to say I remember. 

I'm sorry, album, but I don't know what you're talking about.

Favorite Tracks: Spirit They've Vanished, Untitled, Penny Dreadfuls and La Rapet.

This is my first and probably only NO SCORE review. I'll never give this album a score, ever, and that is both the biggest compliment and the most sincere apology I can give it.

edit: This is an 11/10.