#301 (of 365) "Animal Life" Shearwater

There was a time in the late 2000s when just being a former member / associate of a band related to Will Sheff's Okkervil River made me want to check it out, and that time led me to Shearwater, which had a string of undeniably beautiful songs including "Castaways", "Black Eyes", "Rooks", "Century Eyes", and "Seventy-Four, Seventy Five." They ended up peaking with 2012's "Animal Joy", which resulted in two songs -- their only two -- that made it on this countdown. I caught Jonathan Meiburg and crew a few times in concert--and he appeared with Okkervil River on at least one of their shows--but after Animal Joy, both he and Will stopped recording albums that appealed to me in the same way. Not sure if I changed or they changed, but it is weird to reflect on a band/album that was such a high for me at the time ("Animal Life" was my #2 favorite song of 2012, behind the other Shearwater track that will be on this list later) and is now semi-forgotten. I've spoken before about how much 2013 was a year that changed my life (my move to the NYC area after living my whole life in the boring, basic suburbs of NJ) and it definitely has, in retrospect, changed the type of music I followed, at least for the next 10 years.

"Animal Life" - Shearwater // Animal Joy (2012)