Animal Collective's approach to Thursday night's show at Rams Head Live won't change much compared to previous dates of the group's current tour. Noah Lennox would be lying, though, if he said it was just another stop on the itinerary."Having family there always kind of freaks me out, so it will be different in that respect," Lennox said via a Skype call from his home in Lisbon, Portugal, recently. "My mom almost never comes to shows. My mom and my brother, this time they're definitely going to be there."Thursday's concert is something of a homecoming for Animal Collective, the experimental-pop group that grew up in Baltimore County and surprisingly broke through to the mainstream with "Merriweather Post Pavilion," their album from 2009 — the year they last played in the city.A band with members now living across the globe, Animal Collective — made up of Lennox (aka. Panda Bear), David Portner (Avey Tare) and Brian Weitz (Geologist) — returns to Baltimore in support of "Painting With," their sprightly 10th album that came out in February via the Domino Recording Company. (Josh Dibb, aka Deakin, is also considered a member but he did not write on the new album and is not currently touring with the band. On tour, veteran Baltimore musician Jeremy Hyman plays drums.)Led by the zippy single "FloriDada," the 12-track effort received mostly positive reviews, and illustrated Animal Collective's continued aversion to delivering the expected and familiar. It's something they've made a habit since their days as college-aged musicians, writing the harsh, off-kilter music that made up their crude-but-lively early releases like "Danse Manatee" and "Campfire Songs." The band's catalog has grown increasingly polished since, but maintains the unpredictable DNA that feels so unique and central to Animal Collective.The band was spent after touring in support of their ninth record, 2012's "Centipede Hz." In the years between, members pursued other projects like Avey Tare's Slasher Flicks (which includes Portner, Hyman and Angel Deradoorian) and "Panda Bear Meets the Grim Reaper," Lennox's fifth solo album.When Animal Collective reconvened to work on "Painting With" for two weeks last year in Asheville, N.C., the writing was "easy breezy," Lennox said."That was the first blast of seeing how everyone's parts would work out," he said. "There weren't any hang-ups. The recording studio turned out to be really great. … It was pretty smooth sailing. It was really fast, too."A point of focus was recording a new vocal approach for both singers, Lennox and Portner. The two layered their voices directly on top of each other "to create a singular vocal part, where if you took one of the voices out, it wouldn't work the same way," Lennox said."Just hearing how that came together was exciting, and super fun," he said. The trick is most effective on songs like the propulsive "Natural Selection" and "Lying in the Grass," which finds the vocalists singing, "Get mixed in this crippling fixture / Try and approach the hidden mixtures."Thursday is Animal Collective's first show in the area since October 2012, when they played Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia. Lennox said he doesn't feel nostalgic when he comes back to Baltimore, comparing it to returning to New York, where he lived for five years."That city's so different now. I don't really recognize it," Lennox said. "The thing that you knew is gone, and that's kind of how I feel in Baltimore. My mom lives in a different house than where we grew up."Animal Collective's tour wraps in Mexico this month, and aside from a few likely international shows, Lennox said there are no plans for "any major [Animal Collective] tours" next year. Soon, he'll shift his focus to his solo work as Panda Bear, a project that's been on his mind lately."I just spend a lot of time thinking about it, scheming on what I want to do," he said. Pressed for details, Lennox declined with a laugh."Oh yeah, I definitely have a strong idea of where it's headed," he said, "but I'm not going to tell you that. It's more fun that way."The future holds no definitive plans for Animal Collective, which isn't surprising — its members, ages ranging 36 to 38, operate at their own pace. Still, Lennox does not expect "Painting With" to be the group's final release."Who knows what the future holds?" he said. "But I'd be surprised if we didn't release something else in some form or another."wesley.case@baltsun.comtwitter.com/midnightsunblog