I have a few more things to share about my trip to Nashville (I promise they don’t involve vomit or Jack White), but I have to butt in and right a writing wrong that I, myself, have perpetrated. It’s been 302 days since I last wrote about Animal Collective. How the hell did this happen? AC and I certainly aren’t feuding or anything. As Big Boi once said of his distinguished colleague, André 3000, “Not clashing, not at all.”

I guess one reason might be that they haven’t released a conventional* LP since Merriweather Post Pavilion, but that wasn’t that long ago, right? Let me just check Wikipedia and find out when that wa… January of 2009? WTF?!? There’s no way 40 months have passed since that album came out. It just can’t be true. The songs still feel fresh, despite the fact that I’ve heard them god knows how many times over the past few years. In fact, I’m pretty sure the album hasn’t left my phone’s iPod, and I’ve had at least two phones since January of 2009. The more I think about it, the more it seems like this is a major indicator of an album’s greatness — the amount of time after its release that it stays in the front of your mind (and on the smaller hard drive of your primary listening device).

And my mind isn’t the only one MPP is still occupying. About a month ago, Pitchfork Editor-in-Chief Mark Richardson wrote a really interesting short piece about his experience with the album when it first came out; and just a few days ago, I was getting all jazzed up while talking with a friend about how incredible “Summertime Clothes” is. I’m pretty sure the only thing that could push Merriweather Post Pavilion out of my brain is some new, all-hands-on-the-Collective’s-deck material, which is exactly what we got on Sunday, when the group announced that a new 7-inch single would be released on June 26, and that the two new tracks — “Honeycomb” and “Gotham” — would be available for immediate download when you pre-order the record.

NOW, Sunday should have been the first day of a self-imposed and desperately needed record-buying moratorium, having gone more than a little overboard on Record Store Day and in Nashville this past weekend. But news of the Honeycomb/Gotham 7-inch shattered my resolve so quickly and completely that I’m surprised no one yelled “Mazel tov!” when I was done buying it. Oy. “How many times you say ‘I’m finished with this’ and it starts all over,” “Honeycomb” asks. Well played, Avey Tare. Well played. Check both tunes out below and click here to snag ’em on iTunes.

Animal Collective — “Honeycomb” [Spotify/iTunes]

Animal Collective — “Gotham” [Spotify/iTunes]

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*I did manage to get my hands on Animal Collective’s Record Store Day 2012 release, Transverse Temporal Gyrus — the sound from an audiovisual performance piece that three of the group’s four members put together as part of the Guggenheim’s 50th anniversary celebration — but I’m keeping the cellophane on till I can give it a proper listen. And by “proper listen” I obviously mean middle of the night, lights out and volume unreasonably high. For the sake of marital prosperity, I’ll probably wait until Mrs. You Hear That’s next out-of-town trip.