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Music

Stream Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks With Fifty Minutes Of Psychedelic Visuals

We talked with Abby Portner, the mastermind behind the animation, about its cartoon monsters, found footage, and swirling insanity.

The Creators Project recently covered the behind-the-scenes puppet madness of "Little Fang," the debut music video from Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks, the new band from the Animal Collective member whose first album Enter The Slasher House is officially out on April 8th through Domino. Today, however, the group shared the record in its entirety on YouTube, a stream complemented by fifty minutes of psychedelic visuals, spliced-in footage of 1960s tourism videos, and (of course) the lovable narrative of "Little Fang" where a Jim Henson Creature Shop puppet escapes home to join a traveling circus.

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The entire montage was created by Abby Portner, artist and sister of Avey Tare, who also directed the "Little Fang" video and has worked on the stage design and tour visuals for Animal Collective (as featured in our doc on the artist). The stream is a tour de force of "in-your-face color," as Portner described to The Creators Project in an email this morning. There are cuts of old horror movies over-satured in color, a handful of cartoon monsters, and a deluge of swirling animations. It's awesome and you should watch it. Right now.

While the album is hyper-stimulating in its own right, Portner's contribution adds an extra jolt of multi-sensory mania. We got in touch with her about the visual companion to the stream, and how the animations and film footage have a narrative…of sorts.

The Creators Project: Hey Abby! Now that the full album is streaming in full with the visual pairing, how do you feel about the whole project? Can you look at it objectively now? 

Abby Portner: I'm still too close to it!! It's hard to separate myself when I do the visuals. These will then become the tour visuals so they kind of keep going and growing with the music.

Would you say a narrative exists in the visual stream? It certainly has a consistent (even if abstract) tone throughout—at least in my opinion. 

Ya! I tried to make it like entering a fun house and at the end you leave…strange colors, you see this shadow guy step outside of the colored box and dance… then the last song takes place mostly outside. It's supposed to be all contained in this color madness, haha!

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How would you describe the color palette of the visuals to someone who hasn't seen it? 

Bright and in your face. I tried to make it as colorful as possible—like being at a state fair and seeing all the lights of a midway.

What is your favorite visual moment from the stream? 

I like "The Outlaw" [section] for some reason, but that's my favorite song… I like the movement of the pink cave and the skeleton face, but I also like the overlaid shapes in roses. These visuals were based off of visuals I used for the show they did in Brazil so I attach myself to the live moments and what was my favorite to watch and run during the live show.

Are there any easter eggs hidden in the visuals (besides when Avey Tare appears in the "Little Fang" video!)?

Hmmm I think that was the main one… I got to use extra  footage and get to have Fang [the puppet] sing a big section of the song. I think "The Outlaw" reminds me of Heffalumps and Woozles from Winnie The Poo so there are shots from the Winnie The Poo ride in there haha.

At the 30 min mark there's a helicopter shot of some cars driving in the desert? Where is this footage from? Same thing at the 48 mark—are those clips from old horror movies?

Tha's a palm springs tourism video from the 60s haha. Dave [Avey Tare] wanted that scene to be really deserty. That was the only really specific spot he requested. I am a fan of 60's palm springs aesthetics. I used that and overlaid it a bunch and then warped it.

How do the visuals complement or extend the meaning of each song? What does your visual art add to the stream?

I think thats up to who ever watches it. I do my best to capture what the song "looks" like. But that's what it looks like to me and Slasher Flicks. I hope people find that the visuals are fitting.

Re-visit our past interviw with Abby Portner, here! And keep an eye out for Enter The Slasher House when it's officially out next week!

@zachsokol