"Yeah, stupid. Stop thinking about fun and have it!"

4/30 -

I've sequestered myself in a cheap motel room for what I expect to be my last couple of nights in Sacramento, in order to finish working on a large post that should appear on this blog in the next couple of days. During a dinner break last night, I flipped on the boob tube and caught the last half of the first new episode of The Simpsons I've seen in ages.

The episode closed with a song that I instantly recognized but couldn't quite believe I was hearing.  "Is this really...?" I asked aloud as a shock-wave rippled back in time to the moment, in my late 20's, when I first put Animal Collective's "Sung Tongs" in my CD player and startled my jaded ears, who didn't think there were any new sounds to be heard in the world of "Indie" rock music.

Back then, if you had told me that a song from that album would eventually end up on Prime Time Television, I'd have asked you to watch this video of "Winter's Love," and then asked "Really?  You sure about that?"

http://video.search.yahoo.com/video/play?p=youtube%20animal%20collective%20winters%20love&tnr=21&vid=4775737887096837&turl=http%3A%2F%2Fts2.mm.bing.net%2Fvideos%2Fthumbnail.aspx%3Fq%3D4775737887096837%26id%3Dd2e621ea5604fcc1ed4ae84c627475f9%26bid%3DpxYM8wnd3IMgQg%26bn%3DThumb%26url%3Dhttp%253a%252f%252fwww.youtube.com%252fwatch%253fv%253db7zsWgqBcyo&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Db7zsWgqBcyo&sigr=11a774vln&newfp=1&tit=Animal+Collective+-+Winters+Love

And yet, somehow, you'd have been correct:

http://www.chartattack.com/watch/2012/04/30/animal-collective-and-hot-chip-appear-on-the-simpsons/

There's a great comment beneath that old Animal Collective video, from "1337Ravage":

"i love it how even when some of the top most paid musicians out there using millions of dollars worth of production equipment, just 4 friends siting in some bedroom using one guitar and a couple of make-shift drums can make something even more amazing and interesting then any of them."

Although AC is now using millions of dollars worth of production equipment themselves and showing up on The Simpsons, that old video captures what music can be:  a creative force channeled through individuals, made manifest, and then shaped into a work of creative, collaborative communication.  I find it heartening that, at a time when it can seem like every aspect of popular culture exists as a corporate sales tool, there are still instances of pure, real creativity breaking through.