If indie rock has become a noisier place lately — higher on gurgles and buzzes, fog banks of reverb and distortion-steeped yelps — Animal Collective deserve credit. Their gift, though, is for crafting noise into something pretty, warm and wet, and you can imagine much of co-frontman Avey Tare's solo debut playing at a very hip spa. "Laughing Hieroglyphic" pairs a pulsing accordion with gently chuckling drums, while "Lucky 1" sets a shimmering field of glinting chords against Tare's nasal but airy harmonizing. Those lyrics that aren't unintelligible are inscrutable: half-formed riddles about umbrellas and undertows. At best, the songs nudge around the furniture in your skull. At worst, they burble, drift and pleasantly fade away.

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“1999”

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.