Grizzly Bear Admit Leaking Animal Collective

Thus far, the incoming Animal Collective album Merriweather Post Pavilion, due out January 12 2009, has been a project so secure that the Queen has taken to hiding her crown jewels inside the case. Until this week that was.

One track by the name of Brother Sport found its way to the 'series of tubes' . When the dutiful Web Sheriff, the body largely responsible for keeping unauthorised MP3s off of the internet, came to investigate the leak: it led back to none other than A.C contemporaries Grizzly Bear from Brooklyn.

The band were forced to remove the blog post containing the track and instead posted the following puzzled explanation:

"In what has become an overblown and rather silly manifestation of what I thought was an innocent and encouraging endorsement of Animal Collective’s song “Brother Sport,” I find that after numerous Web Sheriff emails and blog posts about this essential non-event, I must just explain the chain of events:

1. The song was played on a French podcast or radio program.
2. Someone (not me) ripped the song.
3. Many blogs posted the track.
4. I was one of those blogs.
5. The weekend hit, and the Web Sheriff went on patrol.
6. His email to us went into our Spam folder along with Penis Enlargement emails.
7. His email to others that work with us were in the process of being addressed, but most likely were going to wait until Monday morning, after the weekend.
8. Suddenly it was Sunday and note two made its way to us, and the tone had become more harsh.
9. Web Sheriff believed we were ignoring him, but it was an honest misunderstanding.
10. The song was taken down and the apology letter was put up.
11. People took note and blogged about it.
12. I decided to take down Mr. Sheriff’s letter and do this quick-and-easy twelve-step explanation.

"Again, we all value the work and effort that goes into an album. We know first-hand! It was my belief this was already 'out there' and was essentially like a hype track that would just further excite Animal Collective fans (myself included), so I wrongfully figured it was fair game. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the unofficial 'leak' with the official label-sanctioned 'leak'. If I’ve offended anyone in the Animal Collective family with my excited post, I apologize. It was meant to generate even more excitement for what will surely be a great album, and yes the Web Sheriff is just doing his job.

"I hope this makes everyone happy! If Animal Collective would like to blog a song of ours in the future, I’d be more than happy to give it to them. In fact I’d be honored."

In what is hopefully the "official label-sanctioned leak", a video for Brother Sport in included below.

VIDEO: Animal Collective - 'Brother Sport'