I checked out Panda Bear's "Bros" on a lark. I read no reviews, previews, profiles, interviews, blog roundups or advertisements for the song. I had no idea the artist (née Noah Lennox, in Baltimore) was a founding member of experimental rock group Animal Collective, nor did I know that the song was track three on what would prove to be the best album so far in 2007, Person Pitch.I realize that it's only May, and 2007 will see new releases by Bjirk, Wilco and Interpol, to name a few. Albums from such bands as the The Arcade Fire and the much-anticipated collaboration between Modest Mouse and Johnny Marr have already been released. None of that matters.

With Person Pitch, Panda Bear has taken a musical ideal (the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds) and integrated field recordings (without going the way of starry-eyed eco-musicians), tribal-sounding percussion (without treading in Alan Lomax territory) and repetitious vocal tape loops (without taking it as far as the sometimes-unlistenable minimalist composer Steve Reich). The combinations of sounds and effects color each other so as to disguise the original textures of the instruments and voices, creating a glorious, creolized musical pastiche.

However, Person Pitch will not sound like an exotic blend of experimental and outsider styles to readers who choose to listen to the album based on critical reviews and blogger references. After all, the album comes from a member of a critically acclaimed band, and it has generated perhaps more blog hype than it merits. When listening to the album in a pure, uncriticized and unhyped state, the album's brilliance is unhindered by the indie politics that plague the scene.

Some music needs the cultural connotation bestowed upon it by journalists and other opinion makers. Would anyone recognize the name of Italian soundtrack composer Ennio Morricone-responsible for the scores of such films as The Good, The Bad and The Ugly and The Untouchables-if he weren't cited as an influence by so many rock bands? But the fact is, many records released today are marred by speculation, expectation and sensational reviews by bloggers and journalists who shout to make their voices heard over the chatter of so much music writing and news made available to the public by the internet.

Other records are tainted by the cult of image cultivated by their musicians. One should be able to divorce the music from the musician when evaluating either, but the fact is that that is impossible. Art, as they say, is not created in a vacuum.

I listened to "Bros" in a vacuum. Certain facts I learned about Person Pitch later were edifying, it's true. To know that the album was written and recorded at the same time as the birth of Lennox's first child adds meaning to the impenetrable quasi-lyrics. But I don't need to know what Sasha Frere-Jones is going to say about it in The New Yorker or John Pereles in The New York Times. I don't want to read the review on Fluxblog or Pitchfork media. How then, to find new music? There is no clean answer, except to take what you read with a grain of salt and hope what you hear is transcendent.