The album the Chicago Tribune and Stereogum.com have already dubbed one of the best of the week-old year, Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, could make some serious news next week when the Nielsen SoundScan numbers come out.
Why? The album, which won't get released on CD until January 20, dropped on January 6 in a deluxe double-LP 180-gram gatefold vinyl format accompanied by a full album download. And thanks to a series of listening parties across the country, it just might break into the albums chart next week, thanks to vinyl sales only. Yeah, that's right, vinyl sales only (and, oh man, do Web sites loooooove to write about this wacky anachronism).