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HOT OFF THE PRESS (#9) - Of Montreal’s “Skeletal Lamping”
HOT OFF THE PRESS (#9) – Of Montreal’s Skeletal Lamping
by Nick Courtright
It’s Wednesday, and that means it’s time for Nick Courtright’s weekly first glance at music discovered in the last seven days, whether it be just-released, just-leaked, or some long-lost gem that has remained under the radar. Click here for other recent editions of Hot Off the Press, featuring acts such as Vivian Girls, Bodies of Water, White Denim, Conor Oberst, The Walkmen, The Bug, The Music Tapes, Lackthereof, and Grizzly Bear.
Of Montreal – Skeletal Lamping
To be released October 7 on Polyvinyl.
Something has happened to Kevin Barnes. Whereas he once was purely quirky—a Beatlesesque Elephant 6 personality with comic intent and limited musical scope—he now has become the superfamous man of the hour, the widely-adored can-do-no-wrong pinnacle of electro-dance-pop glamour and glory. The transition has been embraced so thoroughly it’s become almost blasphemous to make a disapproving declaration regarding the advances of his personal musical and self-revelatory state—it is as if his evolution has acted as a statement for the acceptance of alternate character, and the warm fuzzy feeling everyone has gotten from it (not to mention a collection of some of the last few years’ most satisfying, endearing, and excellent songs and albums) has created enough goodwill, apparently, for him to push his audience’s ability to accept to a new level.
And that brings us to Skeletal Lamping. Talking with a friend of mine a few listens in, we were trying somewhat confusedly to figure what to make of it—we discussed how the album is almost offensively riddled with the potty talk of a grown man, its seeming disorganization and lack of editing, the suspect similarity of some of its sounds and tactics to previous albums, and I even remarked that I’m finding myself turning it off, which certainly is not a good sign for an album’s likability. We wondered if Barnes, who is often lauded for his unique and obsessive intellect, was for once careless in his decision-making, and if the album’s effusiveness is not the product of a great mind thinking great thoughts, but of a good mind thinking somewhat disorganized thoughts. Also, it seemed so damned overlong (15 tracks, 58 minutes, countless movements). But, as a saving grace, we also mentioned that the last couple Of Montreal albums have been growers that didn’t truly strike upon first listens (a common early sentiment for Hissing Fauna and Sunlandic Twins was “it’s good, but not as good as the last one”), so we should give this one a nice long chance, even if it’s certainly not love at first hear. And that was how we left it.
Sure enough, after dozens of listens, the complex web of penduluming muck Barnes had concocted started to untangle itself into something a little more digestable, and only then did it become easier to accept the possibility that he has not lost himself completely in a bizarre world of cocks, asses, and transgender dance parties wildly galloping through the thesaurus, but that he is fully aware of his well-worn personal bag of tricks, and knows damn well that he’s pushing the buttons of a music community desperate for a challenge. Like Devendra Banhart before him, Barnes is perhaps guilty of more than a little unnecessary genre jumping, and the madcap cobblework of this album makes it seem less like a cohesive collection than a smattering of bits haphazardly patched together; Barnes, though, alluded to that in pre-release interviews, warning listeners that Skeletal Lamping is “My attempt to bring all of my puzzling, contradicting, disturbing, humorous...fantasies, ruminations and observations to the surface, so that I can better dissect and understand their reason for being in my head.” Also subtracting from the mystery of the album, and giving Barnes’ crazed methods a greater rationale, he wrote, “i am so bored with art that makes sense and ‘works’. i wanted to do somethings that didn’t ‘work.’” Apparently, if you disregard the fact that the album will sound pretty good on the thirty-seventh listen, he’s succeeded at that.
So, as you make your way through this impressive and confounding heap of a record, here are a few words of advice for your initial listens:
1. Please, God, on the first listen pay little attention to the lyrics. Barnes has taken them to a new level in regards to sexuality and provocation, and his relentless masturbation through the measures may jar even the most prepared first-time listener. Because of this, let the music itself sink in, and only later try to devour his lyrics, lyrics which still, despite some eyebrow-raising missteps, often ring with a sincere cleverness rarely seen in music.
2. Because of Skeletal Lamping’s insistence upon changing approaches several times within “songs,” listening to the album without attention to the track listing is probably the most desirable approach. Paying even a standard degree of attention to when each of the fifteen tracks break could easily lead you to overanalyze Barnes’ intentions, which though are surely present, need not bother the listener up front.
3. When you say, “It’s good, but not as good as the last one,” be patient, because the passing months may (or may not) prove you wrong.
Listen to songs by Of Montreal here.