Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes Says Their New Album Comes From a 'Darker Place'
'Paralytic Stalks' hits stores on February 7th
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By Matthew Perpetua
December 5, 2011 1:20 PM ET


Of Montreal will release Paralytic Stalks, their 11th studio album, on February 7th. Though the band have not abandoned their distinctive colorful funk, the disc finds frontman and songwriter Kevin Barnes spiking their tunes with abrasive noise, artful orchestration and some of the bleakest lyrics of his career. ("I spend my waking hours haunting my own life / I made the one I love start crying tonight and it felt good," he sings in "Spiteful Intervention" – and that's one of the album's most upbeat numbers.) Barnes recently opened up to Rolling Stone about grappling with depression while working on the new material, his plan to change the tone of the group's theatrical live show and his disappointment with the response to his band's previous album, False Priest. You can stream "Wintered Debts," the first track released from Paralytic Stalks, above, or download the song for free here.

The press release that was sent by your publicist along with your new album made a point of stressing that you're singing entirely from the first person in these songs, that you're not using any personas this time around. Why was it important to make sure people knew that?
It’s not really something I felt like I needed to disclose, but I guess on some levels, it's just the reality. It was sort of also a decision that I had made, though in some ways it was sort of made for me, because I was going through a difficult period. And a lot of times when I go through those kinds of periods, I use music as a sort of form of therapy. So, I guess I wasn't in good enough spirits to fool around with a persona.

So you work through more upbeat themes through fictional characters?
I think so. I think usually, that if I'm in a happy, balanced state of mind, my imagination tends to go in that direction, where I'm able to create a more positive atmosphere musically. I think I am a bit of an Eeyore. And when I'm feeling better, I really want to sort of want to magnify the effects of that, and that's why I'll create these really outlandish characters.

Did you know going into this album that it was going to be a particularly dark set of songs?
Yeah. I'm not going to just write when I'm happy. I also need to write when I'm in a darker place. I definitely didn't want to be there, but I just sort of found myself there. False Priest is very colorful and more upbeat for the most part. There are kind of darker songs, but for the most part, I was trying to make something that was more like Earth, Wind and Fire or Sly and the Family Stone. Something that was more funky and positive. But somehow that didn't last, and I sort of fell back into this darker place and was just writing songs from that perspective. But it wasn't really something that I set out to do as far as, "I want to make a dark record." It was "I need to make a record" or "I need to make music" because it's one thing I find extremely fulfilling and also distracts me, in a positive way, from my condition.

What brought on this dark phase you were in?
I think it's some sort of cyclical thing, you know? That you just have ups and downs. And I have a lot of depression issues. A lot of people in my family have had a lot of depression issues. In the past, I've tried to make things that are really upbeat, to sort of change my mood or try to alter my mood in a way. Somehow make myself happier. To some extent I'm still doing that with this record. It's still poppy, it's not extremely morose and minor. It definitely has a hookiness to it.

When you perform the darker songs in concert, do you reconnect with that mood?
The first 20, 30, 40 times that we play it, it's definitely still connected to the source. You know, a song like "Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse" has an upbeat, dancey quality to it and the lyrics are much darker. But just by creating a sort of carnival-esque atmosphere, it sort of changed the song in my head. And now when I play it, I'm not really thinking about the original inspiration. I'm thinking about what it has become. And it's sort of become this anthem in a way.

How are you planning to present these new songs live? It seems like it may be tricky to get across some of these arrangements.
Yeah, it's going to be a serious challenge. Zac Cowell, the guy who played the woodwinds and the brass instruments on the record, is joining the band. He is going to be playing those parts, but they're all multi-layer parts, so I think we'll have to experiment with having some samples mixed in with the live playing. And, you know, maybe have people playing parts that were originally on a flute on a synthesizer, or things like that. So it will sound different from the record. It probably won't sound exactly like the record, but we'll try to get pretty close.

Are you going to change the way you present the show visually for these new songs?
Yeah, I'm really excited about that actually. Right now we're still developing ideas. I think, in the past, we've sort of had fun using comedic elements – we've had performance artists coming out in different kinds of costumes and definitely on the False Priest tour, it was way more comedic and sort of Dada, sort of absurd stuff happening. And we've been doing that for a while and it was really fun, but I think now we want to do something slightly more abstract that is relying more on projections. But not just projecting onto a screen behind the drum set, but actually using the whole stage to create a very dynamic visual experience.

There are a few different shows that you've done in New York that have a few over-the-top sort of antics, like when you came out on stage riding a horse at the Roseland Ballroom. Do you feel a need to top that sort of thing, or do you want to move away from it?
I'm trying to not necessarily back away from it, but I feel like right now there's so much flash in music, so much showmanship. Which is great, like Lady Gaga, for example. But I think that in my head, I want to make something that's less superficial. I've been listening to a lot of John Lennon solo stuff and realizing how powerful that music is when it's more raw and direct. I want the stage production to work within that context. I've done that already, you know? I've been on a horse. I've been naked. I've covered myself in glitter, and all that stuff, and it was really fun but I don't want to just do it over and over again. I don't want to become a caricature of Georgie Fruit or whatever. I want to keep growing as an artist. I want to keep doing different things and trying different things and exploring my imagination.

How will this affect your choices of what older songs to play?
I had this kind of cool realization recently where, forever I've been thinking that, "Oh, the show has to be this upbeat dance party from start to finish, and I just want all the songs to kind of blend together and I want it to feel sort of like a mix-tape, like a really well-made, upbeat mix-tape." I realized there's a sort of insecurity in that; you're always afraid of letting the energy go down, and it's almost like you want to get off the stage at a super-high point and you worry about there ever being a moment where people get bored and start talking. But I want to be less insecure. We've got this hour and a half, whatever it is, 70 minutes on stage, and there's no reason to feel like, "Oh we need to apologize for taking chances with certain songs that aren't necessarily everyone's favorite song." I'd rather play slightly more obscure songs that fit the mood of Paralytic Stalks, rather than make it this upbeat dance party. That's not to say it's going to be extremely tedious and pretentious and boring, you know? I just want to make something that's a bit heavier, more beautiful and more emotive.

So what older songs would fit into this kind of show?
I was thinking of playing "Nonpareil of Favor," which is on Skeletal Lamping. It definitely starts off really upbeat and happy, and then it goes into this kind of crazy, noisy guitar thing. So I'd like to play some of the longer songs. Because most of the songs on Paralytic Stalks are pretty long. Or at least half of them are at least six to 10 minutes long.

When you write a song like that, are you kind of piecing together different fragments and ideas?
Well, nowadays, I don't usually write before I record. So I'll write and record a section of a song and work on that for a couple days, and once that's done, it’s "Okay, well now where do I want this song to go?" So I'll work in blocks of a minute, minute and a half. So you could say, "Well that could be a verse and that could be the chorus so let's just repeat that verse and repeat the chorus again and you're done! " Which is kind of a lazy way to write songs, but that's just the way pop music goes, for some reason. There's so much repetition in pop music, and that's cool, that's what it's about. But sometimes I like to get out of that and put a little bit more thought into it and make it a bit more transportive and not worry so much about the hookiness of it.

When did you make that shift over to kind of writing directly to tape?
I guess it was probably around The Sunlandic Twins. I think Satanic Panic in the Attic, I was still writing songs on acoustic guitar and working on it a couple months before recording it. Then I sort of realized there's no real reason to do that. Which on some levels is kind of a shame, because whenever I try to do solo shows, I don't even know what to do with myself because it seems so boring just playing them on acoustic guitar. But back in the day, when you're writing on the acoustic guitar, at least for me, I would try to make the acoustic guitar part kind of interesting too. But now it's like all about the layers and instrumentation, which doesn't really translate as well on acoustic guitar.

Was there anything that came out in the past year that really inspired you?
I was really inspired by Sufjan Stevens' record, The Age of Adz. That woke me up in a way where I realized that music doesn't have to be extremely digestible. You don't have to think about getting a song on someone's iPod playlist. You don't have to accommodate the direction that people are going with music, where they want one single, they don't give a shit about a record, they just want one single that they can put against all of the other singles and I feel there's a superficiality to that. At least for me, for someone who loves music and wants to connect with the human race through music or art, you don't really get that with some three-minute pop song about getting drunk and partying and all that.

The first song you put out from this record is "Wintered Debts." Why did you choose that song as people's introduction to the new album?
I think it was a pretty good representation of what people will be able to expect on the record. It is one of the longest songs and it's one of the more intimate songs – at least it starts that way until it transforms into something different. We could have picked any number of songs on the record, but I guess that one just felt right. I don't care if any of the songs get played on the radio and I don't care if it's even a popular record with people. I'd hope that people can connect with it, but that wasn't the motivation for making it. I'm not really plotting like, "This will be the one that gets them! And then I'll give 'em this one!" It's not like that. It doesn't matter. People could hear any of the songs.

Did you have greater commercial ambitions for any of the previous records?
Yeah, definitely. With False Priest, I was definitely hoping it would help us take the next step commercially, and that's why I did certain things like make a song that was kind of shorter, but also gave them logical titles. And it's funny because for some reason in my head I thought it was a very commercially acceptable record, but I was listening to it the other day and realizing that it's actually not that commercial. It's not a record that would necessarily make a band, or get a band on the television, or break a band, because it's still pretty artsy and weird, and also anachronistic in that it's pulling from these influences that most 18-year-olds aren't interested in. Most 18-year-olds don't think Isaac Hayes is awesome.

2011-12-10 - The Therapy Of Music

The Therapy of Music: Exclusive Interview with DJ List Cristee a.k.a Kevin Barnes from of Montreal
Natasha Mijares December 8, 2011
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The Therapy of Music: Exclusive Interview with DJ List Cristee a.k.a Kevin Barnes from of Montreal

As the December 10 show featuring Au Revoir Simone’s Miami debut approaches, the city has been set ablaze with anticipation not only for these songstresses, but for the DJ sets as well. I got the chance to have a phone interview with DJ List Cristee, otherwise known as Kevin Barnes from the acridly glam pop group, of Montreal. We discussed his fairly new DJing career and about of Montreal’s upcoming album, Paralytic Stalks, which shall be released in the US Feburary 7, 2012 by Polyvinyl Records Co.

The album mixes the flowery, ethereal quality that stays true to their sound with wretched and almost primitive lyrics that come together to make a beautiful milieu of Barnes’ personal experiences. He’s introduced some new elements in this album that can be heard in the album teaser “Wintered Debts” below. However, Barnes continues to uses his personal relationship as paradigms of the relationship man has to the world. He covers many topics, from drunk calling in Sao Paolo, to the void we feel as a solitary planet in a giant solar system, as seen in Tensional Parapraxes (Dour Percentage) where he says “our parents aside, this planet is an orphanage, and it cheapens us the way you and I torment each other”

The album has an inescapable “manic energy” that Barnes shows in Spiteful Intervention when he sings: “lately I’m rutted in the filth of self-authored agonies that really should fill me with shame but all I have is this manic energy.” Barnes has shared that the reason for this mood is because of his problems with depression, and that writing this album has been helping him battle it. In essence, we are really riding along the journey of Barnes psyche and receiving that sense of illumination and wonder in the end.
Listen to the album teaser, “Wintered Debts” (not the lead single):

Wintered Debts by of Montreal


Therapy Life: What kind of music or artists do you like to include in your DJ sets?

Kevin Barnes: I like to play a lot of 60s, 70s, 80s funk and R&B; Sly and the Family Stone, Elements, Prince, Cameo, all sorts of things.

TL: How long have you been DJing as List Cristee and how did you come up with the name?

KB: I guess I’ve been doing it since about a year ago or so. The name, I’m not really sure where that came from; it’s just a strange name that came to me, haha.

TL: We’re also anticipating of Montreal’s next album Paralytic Stalks, which was recorded in your home studio in Athens, Georgia. Would you say that a Southern influence is present in your music?

KB: Uhm, maybe on some level. I might be like Outkast, haha. There are some Southern artists that I like. But I mean, I guess there are different kind of Southern music, there’s like Southern rock and hip-hop. I’m definitely more influenced by hip-hop and R&B than Southern rock.

TL: What kind of creative processes do you take in writing and producing an album? Do you write on tour or do you lock yourself at home and write?

KB: I do a lot of lyric writing on tour when I’m traveling, but pretty much all the music is written at home.

TL: What effect do you think your writing process has on the lyrics?

KB: Well, if you’re traveling, you’re experiencing all these different things that you wouldn’t necessarily experience when you’re at home. When you’re at home, you kind of get into a routine. Especially with writing, you get a lot of consistency, which sometimes is good, but sometimes it’s bad.

TL: The music of the album is riddled with intricate compositions that some would say resembles modern classical, while at others echo at neo-prog, pseudo-country, and 60s pop. How would you characterize or personify the relationship between the lyrics and the music on this album?

KB: They’re equally as important for me. When I’m making music I want it to be interesting and unpredictable and when I’m writing lyrics I want it to have those same characteristics. With this album, I’ve definitely written more personal lyrics, from the heart, and from my personal life. So it’s not really as fantasy based, it’s all rooted in reality and I’ve been going through some tough times so I’m kind of using the music as a form of therapy in a way, because the creative process is a form of therapy.

TL: After adding violinist Kishi Bashi to the touring line-up, you’ve been working with session musicians for the first time in your career. How do you think that changes the of Montreal sound as a whole and are you enjoying how the music is evolving?

KB: Yeah it’s good because, especially with Kishi Bashi, I would write something and do a lot of work on it and I’d kind of get to the point where I wasn’t sure what I could do to change it or make it more interesting, and I would send it to him and he would come up with all of these ideas that would help transform it. Then he would write stuff to me and I would use that as inspiration for new ideas for myself. So it was really great with him and also with Zach Cowell, who is also gonna join the line-up. He played all the woodwinds and the brass on the record and we had a smooth relationship as well, so it was really cool to have people that could contribute things that you’d never be able to contribute. It’s not like a piano player and a guitar, those things I can handle on my own, but I wanted people that play things that I don’t know how to play and that I’d never be able to do on my own. It’s always good to have people that can contribute something special.

TL: Who did the album artwork and why did you choose that piece for the cover?

KB: David did the cover, my brother. He listens to the record while he’s producing the artwork. So he kind of used that as inspiration and tried to, in a way, represent the sounds on the record visually. It’s always a sort of abstract translation; the sounds just sort of made that image in his brain.

TL: Will you be using this kind of imagery for the live shows?

KB: Yeah, the live show is going to be very visual but it’s not going to be as theatrical in a sense because we’ve been using a lot of comedic characters for a couple of tours. It’s almost been like a comedy show, sort of like a Dada comedy show as far as theatrics. For this one, because the subject matter of the record is much darker and more personal, we wanna present it in a different light. It will still be very visual and interesting on that level, but it won’t be as comedic.

TL: So will Georgie Fruit (Barnes’ on stage persona) be back for Paralytic Stalks?

KB: Haha, maybe for the encore but not for the regular show.

TL: There are some very big concepts that the album discusses such as revenge, self-hatred and the egocentric man. What kind of lessons on humanity and existence would you say is most apparent in the album or do you think that people will walk away with?

KB: Well, yeah, it’ a very bitter album in that way, which I think you can lose yourself in bitterness and it’s definitely not the path to enlightenment. It’s definitely more of a self absorbed, kind of negative trip. But sometimes you kind of have to go through it. It’s an element of the healing process. It’s okay to be really hateful and really bitter for a period of time but you eventually have to get over it. So it’s kind of a weird record in a way cause if you stop listening to it midway through, it might actually put you in a bad mood but if you can make it all the way to the end of the record it has some sort of weird healing power at the very end. I’ve noticed that myself when I listen to it. I kind of need to listen to it all the way through in order to feel that sense of balance returning.

2008-10-01 - Rolling Stone

The Surreal Life

– Rolling Stone, 2008-10-01

Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes is obsessed with Prince, suicide, and borrowing his wife's tights. Meet rock's newest damaged genius.

There are many things that Kevin Barnes' wife might prefer he not talk about. For instance, when she became pregnant a few years ago, the idea of becoming a father so terrified Barnes that he considered committing suicide. Or that after his daughter was born, his misbehavior on the road nearly destroyed their marriage. Or that he suffers from chronic depression, which he treats with the powerful antidepressant Cymbalta in a haphazard regimen. "I take it every three days or so," says the 34-year-old leader of the cult-fave psychedelic pop group Of Montreal. "I should probably take it more, but I kind of like that it messes up my mind. Every day is like a roller coaster — sometimes I feel really good, and sometimes I feel all tingly." Today is a Cymbalta day, which makes Barnes feel "introspective and weird." In the Athens, Georgia, band's industrial rehearsal space, downwind from a chicken-processing plant, Barnes stands quietly among his cheerful, PBR-drinking bandmates, with a purple Vitaminwater at his feet and a glossy Rickenbacker strapped to his slight frame. Dressed like Ziggy Stardust on a casual Friday — skintight red jeans, octagonal clear-frame sunglasses, a jaunty blue scarf adorned with tiny white stars — he absently noodles on "Day Tripper" before calling the song "Triphallus, to Punctuate!" from the band's new album, Skeletal Lamping (out October 21st). Three of his bandmates grab basses and pick out complex, strangely melodic lines as Barnes lets loose with an effects-heavy series of "ooh-ooh-oohs" that sound like Freddie Mercury on helium.

As with the last two Of Montreal records, Barnes recorded Skeletal Lamping (the title came to him after reading a Dylan Thomas poem) at home on his computer. An idea-packed pastiche inspired by Brian Wilson's SMiLE and Prince's Sign o' the Times, Lamping boosts the group's oddball pop with its polyperverse, sexed-up lyrics and kitchen-sink range — from hip-hop and disco to freaked-out soul and Stones-y blues. It arrives just a year after Barnes inadvertently introduced himself to the masses by allowing Outback Steakhouse to use his 2005 song "Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games" in its ads. (The Australian-themed chain added didgeridoo and changed the lyric "Let's pretend we don't exist/Let's pretend we're in Antarctica" to "Let's go Outback tonight/Life will still be here tomorrow.") "They told me it was just going to be a radio jingle," he says. "And of course it wasn't — it became the anthem of Outback Steakhouse. The reality is it's definitely not good to sell a song to a commercial, as far as allowing people to have their own memories of a song." Barnes posted an anguished essay, "Selling Out Isn't Possible," online, writing, "The pseudo-Nihilistic punk rockers of the '70s created an impossible code that no one can actually live by."

But looking back, Barnes says the fear that he'd damaged his credibility fueled Lamping's adventurous spirit. "I was like, 'If you're going to call me a phony, I'm going to prove that there's nothing about me motivated by record sales,'" he says. Take Georgie Fruit, a character Barnes introduced on Of Montreal's 2007 album Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, and in whose voice he sings much of the new record. "He's an African-American man who was in an R&B band called Arousal in the Seventies," Barnes says. "They didn't go very far, and he ended up in prison, where he had a lot of weird experiences and decided to be a woman. So he had a sex change. He's very free — I think of him as a genderless superhuman, untouched by taboos or the boring parts of our culture." (Barnes is considering an Arousal "reissue" as a side project: "It would be totally fun." He's also working on an album with MGMT's Andrew VanWyngarden under the name Blikk Fang.)

Of Montreal's live shows have evolved into over-the-top glam spectacles involving surreal props, whimsical sets and multiple costume changes — and, on one occasion, a fully nude Barnes performing against projected clips of Seventies gay porn. As the tours have grown increasingly baroque, Of Montreal have developed a reputation as kind of a Grateful Dead for arty, sexually ambiguous kids (plus David Byrne and Bono, who have both been spotted at gigs) who use the shows as an opportunity to dress up in hypercolorful garb, apply liberal amounts of makeup and glitter, and get supremely elevated on booze and drugs. In a few weeks, the band is heading off on its biggest tour yet, a theatrical production complete with elaborate costumes (drag, mythological creatures, giant kimonos), Madonna-size video screens and a cadre of "performance artists" who will act out choreographed scenes, including a brawl in a Deadwood-style saloon. "The inspiration is very Michel Gondry," Barnes says. "Or the kid in Rushmore that puts on those productions."

At rehearsal, Barnes' five bandmates appear to have been sent over from Indie-Rock Central Casting. Guitarist Bryan Poole has a Neil Young look involving bushy sideburns and an awesome tricked-out art project of a car (with a complicated back story about an artist friend's attempt to assemble a militia to capture a mysterious local known as the 8-Track Gorilla); bassist Davey Pierce lives in a garage next door among at least a dozen vintage mopeds in various states of operability; synth player Dottie Alexander sports a pink cheerleaderish skirt and polka-dot tights; and multi-instrumentalist Jamey Husband has an ascotlike scarf that recalls Fred's from Scooby-Doo. Rocking a cool straw hat and an unbuttoned cardigan without a shirt is drummer Ahmed Gallab, the latest addition. Gallab (who's been in town for less than a month and lives in the loft above the rehearsal space) emigrated from Sudan when he was a kid, and is eagerly waiting for rehearsal to stop so he can break his Ramadan fast. "There's two sides of Of Montreal," Barnes explains the next day. "There's the recorded music, which I've been predominantly doing myself. But the performing band is collaborative, and everyone is deeply invested emotionally and financially."

Barnes grew up in Grosse Pointe, Michigan, a well-off suburb of Detroit. "I listened to a lot of poodle rock," he says. "Mötley Crüe and Ratt were my favorite bands, and I covered my bedroom with pictures I cut out of Hit Parade and Circus." When he was 13, his parents — an accountant father (with dreams of becoming a stand-up comic) and teacher mother — bought him a black Pearl drum kit like Tommy Lee's. He formed his first band, Wit's End, singing and playing drums with a local kid named Mark Tremonti, who went on to become the guitarist in Creed. "Kevin was always a real talented guy," Tremonti recalls (the two haven't spoken since high school). "And he had a really cool voice and an artistic edge to him. Just to be able to write songs at that age was amazing. Our best song was 'Pull My Trigger.' It was pretty much a sex, drugs and rock & roll type of tune. You know, that Mötley Crüe thing. Dangerous lyrics. For a group of eighth-graders it was pretty edgy."

A year later, Barnes' father lost his job and moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, to look for work, leaving Barnes with a profound feeling of uncertainty. He fell into his first major depression. "Things were fucked up, and I was getting into trouble at school," he says. "Even though I wanted to be a rebel, there was a part of me that was sweet and wanted to be accepted." (Tremonti remembers, "He didn't really adhere to authority — he was a guy who probably got in trouble more than the average kid.")

Barnes began suffering increasingly debilitating anxiety attacks, culminating in what he refers to as "a weird drug experience." "It was my birthday and my friends bought me all this pot," he says. "Maybe because I was still developing, I had this bizarre reaction where I totally lost my mind. I really thought I was dying. After that I became conscious of how vulnerable we are psychologically. I still feel touched by that experience, which used to bother me. Like, what the fuck is wrong with me — I still feel as crazy as I did when I was a teenager. But now I feel like it's good, like it fuels my creativity."

In Florida, Barnes made a crucial discovery — British Invasion rock, particularly the Beatles, the Kinks and the Rolling Stones. "I was delivering pizzas, and I got The Kink Kronikles on vinyl," he says. "I put it on a cassette and listened until I wore it out." Playing along to an early Stones comp on guitar, Barnes taught himself chords, and by the time he finished school, he had released a collection of tunes on the influential indie label Bar/None. In search of a band, he headed to Athens after seeing the classic documentary Athens, GA. Inside/Out. "I was just dying to find like-minded people to play with," he says. "But I never thought in a million years that I would ever have a career in music — I was just a kid with a four-track recorder with no friends and no prospects."

Athens has two abiding passions: University of Georgia football and off-kilter art rock. Best known as the birthplace of R.E.M., Athens also nurtured freaked-out proto-alt bands such as the B-52s and Pylon, who exploded from acid-fueled UGA parties in the early Eighties. A decade later, when Barnes arrived fresh out of high school, a new scene was starting to take off — centered around a tight group of Beatles-and-analog-recording-obsessed indie bands that referred to themselves as the Elephant Six Collective. "It was just a great explosion of talent," Barnes says of his early years there. "Very bohemian, everyone living together, three or four people sleeping on the floor, everyone playing on each other's records. And there was the excitement of seeing Michael Stipe at a house party, wearing a straw hat, looking really cool. I'd be like, 'Oh, my God.'"

Until 2004's awesomely titled Satanic Panic in the Attic, the first Of Montreal record Barnes made by himself, the band was mainly inspired by the Elephant Six groups (Neutral Milk Hotel, Olivia Tremor Control, the Apples in Stereo among them), whom Barnes befriended shortly after moving to town. "They were kind of like big brothers to me," he says. "I sort of worshipped them — like, God, they're making records and going on tour, they have a publicist, a booking agent, all these things." Living together in a series of communal houses, including a $400-a-month brick bungalow he shared with Neutral Milk leader Jeff Mangum ("It was a total party house — we had a skateboard quarter pipe in the living room and no heat"), Of Montreal cut several low-fi albums between day jobs. "We all wanted to sound like the Beatles," Barnes says. "And everyone was turning each other on to lost psychedelic classics — like someone would go on tour and discover, like, Os Mutantes or the Pretty Things' S.F. Sorrow and bring it back to the circle. Everyone would be really influenced by them."

Of Montreal's breakthrough, 2007's Hissing Fauna, veers from synthy electro pop to sun-splashed R&B inspired by psychedelic-soul great Shuggie Otis (name-checked on the standout "Faberge Falls for Shuggie"). On about half the songs, Barnes' vocals shift into a life-affirming falsetto — but the lyrics are more harrowing than groovy. Hissing Fauna's emotional center, "Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse," finds Barnes singing, "I'm in a crisis/I need help/C'mon mood, shift back to good again . . . chemicals don't make me sick again."

Barnes met Nina Twin — a talented visual artist and musician — at a gig in Oslo in 2001. After a long-distance courtship, she moved to Athens and joined the band on bass. When she became pregnant in 2004, the couple moved to Nina's native Norway to take advantage of the Scandinavian nation's free health care. "The government actually pays you when you have a child," Barnes says. "So we said, 'Fuck it, let's put everything in storage, go to Norway and see what happens from there.'"

Barnes suffered the deepest depression of his adult life, becoming mired in anxiety, paranoia and persistent thoughts of suicide. (Heimdalsgate is the name of the street where they settled in Oslo.) "I was totally isolated, totally broke, we were couch surfing, and I had never imagined myself a father. I found the concept of having a child terrifying, and it is terrifying. There was so much terror in my mind. It was so much easier to live in a dream state where all I had to worry about was myself." And as scary as the pressures of fatherhood were, the fear that he'd have to give up music was worse. "We had been a band for seven years, but never had any commercial success," Barnes says. "But the thing that motivated me wasn't praise or acclaim — it was the process of creation. So there was no reason for me to stop making music, until there was the idea that, fuck, if I have a kid . . . I'll have to stop fuckin' around and take care of my kid."

Encouraged by their booking agent, the couple returned to the U.S. to launch a tour behind the surprisingly popular Satanic Panic. After an attempt to bring their daughter, Alabee, on the road failed, the tour continued without Nina — who became increasingly resentful of being left behind. "Understandably so," Barnes says. "Taking care of a baby is nowhere near as much fun as going on tour."

With Nina at home, and fueled by champagne and antidepressants, Barnes began bringing his glam superqueen live-show persona to the afterparties. "I think the medication allowed him to function, but it also caused his psyche to become more disassociated from feelings like empathy — especially when alcohol is involved," says guitarist Poole, who records his own psychedelic side project as the Late BP Helium. "He'd do stuff like come up to you and stick his hand down your pants and start jerking off your dick. Or, like, try to make out with you, or take all his clothes off and just start walking around at parties."

Nina and Alabee moved back to Norway, and for half a year Barnes went on without them. But then something clicked inside. "I was looking for another Nina, in a way," he says. "But I realized what I had with her was so special. And I was missing Alabee a lot. My whole life I've been sort of detached emotionally, but with Alabee I understand true love. When I'd go visit them in Norway, Alabee would stand at the windowsill and cry because she wanted to see me. That's when you realize you need to be there for your child, because she needs you, she loves you. And you can't take that lightly."

For now, Barnes and Nina seem happy. They just bought a chic, modern, three-bedroom house in the leafy Athens neighborhood of Five Points, separated from the neighbors by tall, shady trees and a long driveway. The sun-soaked rooms feel homey and somehow Scandinavian, accessorized with high-end kitchen gear, an upright piano, framed expanses of cheery Marimekko fabric, Nina's artwork and shelves full of tasteful books (spotted: Portnoy's Complaint, Gravity's Rainbow, Bob Dylan's Chronicles, Dave Eggers' What Is the What).

Barnes' mom lives in a house next door and helps out with Alabee. When he's not making music, Barnes spends a lot of time in front of his new flatscreen TV, watching NFL games. "When I was a kid, like in high school and stuff, I felt very feminine," he says. "But I'm also very athletic, very into sports. I read ESPN magazine. I watch SportsCenter all the time. I'm a big Cleveland Browns and Indians fan."

Sitting on his big new patio as the sun sets, with Nina puttering around in an embroidered housedress, Barnes seems relaxed. His sunglasses are off, revealing sleepy, vulnerable eyes. But the couple's hard-won contentment could be shaken in a couple of weeks, when Of Montreal hit the road again for a yearlong tour. "I'm not always a very attentive husband," Barnes admits. "And there's no way I could be with Alabee all the time and never do anything in the adult world. Nina's a lot like me — it's hard for her to have a three-year-old as her only companion. But she's going to be performing the first four or five shows, and I'm excited. Hope springs eternal."

2008-11-13 - Paste (part 7)

Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes: The complete Paste interview

Steve LaBate, photo by Jeremy Cowart By on November 13, 2008 4:10 PM |

Paste: Tell me how you got your first record deal.
Barnes: I had this friend, we were like best friends in Florida, and he was way more in touch—he had an older brother who turned him on to some things, and he knew about the indie scene, about indie labels, which I had no clue about. I guess there was some list that had all the indie labels, and there was this book about how to put out a record on an indie label, or how to start a label or something like that. We wrote songs together, and I wrote my own songs on the side. He got a list of all these labels, so we made a demo. Nobody seemed at all interested except Bar/None who wrote back and said they liked what they heard and wanted to hear more, so we sent them more and they were like, “eh, that’s pretty cool,” but they weren’t that into it. So, in secret, I sent my own tape with my own songs and they were like, “hey this is cool, we like this a lot,” but this put me in a weird position with my friend because they rejected the songs we wrote together and they liked the songs I wrote myself. For a while, I tried to sneak him into the contract, where we’d write the songs together and I’d sing them, but I’d try to sing them in his style, but [the label] wasn’t really that into that, and eventually it was obvious they didn’t want that stuff, they wanted my stuff. After a couple years of trying to work it out, we started to split apart, and I realized I’d be better off working by myself, so I just signed the contract with Bar/None and put my own songs out.

Paste: Are you from Athens originally?
Barnes: No, originally I’m from Cleveland, Ohio.

Paste: After Florida, you ended up in Cleveland and Minneapolis for a bit. Tell me what was going on in your life then, and about what made you come to Athens.
Barnes: The funny thing is, the guy I was telling you about, my friend from Florida, he was a huge R.E.M.

fan. He got his hands on a copy of Athens, GA Inside/Out, the documentary. We were trying to find a place to move, to get a band together, and Athens seemed like this fantasyland. We really romanticized it.

Julian Koster [of the Music Tapes] lived in Athens at the time and was also signed to Bar/None with his band, Chocolate USA. I was talking to Bar/None, saying I was trying to get a band together, “Where do you think I should go?” And they were like, “we have this other artist who’s kind of in the same position you guys are, he lives in Athens and he seems pretty happy, you should go meet him.” So I called him and talked for two hours, and it was like, “this guy’s awesome, he’s totally on the same page.” My friend and I moved to Athens together, but for whatever reason, he decided he didn’t want to live there anymore and moved away, but I stayed. I ended up living in the same house with Jeff Mangum [of Neutral Milk Hotel] and Will Hart and Bill Doss [both of Olivia Tremor Control]. It was amazing. All of a sudden I realized, “I’m not a freak! There are people who are into the same kind of music, and four-track recording and the DIY ’60s-psych-pop thing.” I think that was super-important for my development, to give me the support to keep going. I’d felt like I was the only one doing this thing, so it was so exciting to meet a group of like-minded people—it’s like, “holy shit, you’re doing the same thing and you’re 10 times better than me, this is so exciting!” But after a while, sometimes when you’re a kid—I was 18 at the time, and I had saved up money to move to Athens, but of course I spent all my money in a couple of months. I couldn’t really manage to support myself so I had to move back to my parents’ house in Florida. I should have just moved back to Athens when I had the money again, but I decided to try a couple of different places. I tried Cleveland because my sister lived there, and tried Minneapolis, but that didn’t work out. Eventually, I came back to Athens and have been here ever since.

Paste: Since it took so long for Of Montreal to have any kind of commercial success, did you ever doubt yourself and doubt the music you were making?
Barnes: I never really doubted myself. It’s kind of like that thing—when you believe in it, even though it’s not selling, you can always say, “well, people just don’t get it.” It definitely was frustrating as hell. I wasn’t very happy during the early years. I hated working at these non-committal jobs and having to spend so much time doing that.

Paste: What kind of day jobs did you have?
Barnes: I worked at a video store forever, and I did some telemarketing—all sorts of jobs you can’t really get any fulfillment out of. It seemed really impossible to earn a living playing music. It was like this code I just couldn’t figure out how to crack. How are these other people doing it? Are they more talented than I am? Are they smarter than I am? Why can’t I do it? But I never gave up because there was no reason to give up. Making music was the only thing that fulfilled me. I wasn’t going to give up just because people weren’t buying my records because that would’ve deprived me of something super-important in my life, of my whole focus of existing. It was definitely frustrating and depressing, and I almost feel like I paid too many dues. I’ve been kind of scarred by the amount of dues I paid. I was so emotionally invested in every show, and you go on tour for years and play to 50 people, and you’re like, “What the fuck, this is our third record, our fourth record, our fifth record and we’re still playing to 50 people. What the hell’s going on? Why isn’t it clicking with people?” You just can’t figure it out. And then, like magic, all of a sudden people start caring and you’re like, “What happened? Why is it different now?” But I’m happy. I’m psyched people care now because I know all too well what’s it like to play when people don’t care.

Paste: I interviewed you before a show at the 40 Watt in Athens right before Sunlandic Twins came out, and you seemed like you were in a pretty good place at the time. You told me, “I got married and I felt really emotionally strong. I was stable and happy and using that energy to make music.” But between then and Hissing Fauna you went through a difficult period—some depression and you and Nina split up for a while.
Barnes: Yeah, we split up for 3 months.

Paste: What was this time in your life like, and what do you think brought on this depression? How was your mindset when making Hissing Fauna?
Barnes: When I look back on it now, I think that it all centered around having [my daughter] Alabee. Being married is one thing, that sort of connects you to the world on one level, but there are so many anxieties that come with being a father that I wasn’t prepared for. I was living in this fantasy world inside my head, in this sort of bubble, and having a child roots you to the earth on such a huge level. It really slaps you in the face, like, “I am mortal, I am not going to last forever, I am responsible for this little thing, I have to take care of her.” It puts you in this strange, fractured state of mind, especially when you’re so used to being self-centered and egotistical all the time. That was really difficult for me. Also, the scenario around her birth—we were in Norway and we didn’t have a place to live, didn’t have a house of our own. We were couch-surfing, which is so insane when I think about it now. Nina’s eight months pregnant and we’re couch-surfing in a foreign country. Even though Satanic Panic had done well, we didn’t really have any money to speak of. There was no way we could’ve had Alabee in the United States because it would’ve ruined us, we would’ve been so far in debt. But in Norway, they take care of their citizens—they actually give you money [when you’re having a child]. You don’t have to pay for anything; they give you money to help out. So we decided to do it over there. We took everything out of our house and put it in storage, and went to Norway—without a home, without a country, just floating around, waiting for this child to be born and freaking out. Sunlandic Twins was done but hadn’t come out yet, and I knew I was going to have to go on tour once the record was done. It was a really weird transitional period, and that transition was really difficult for me. It took me a long time to find my footing again after that. I think that was the cause of my depression, but also, a big part of it was being on tour and Nina has this two-month-old baby back in Athens, living in this little apartment. I’m on tour, which is like a party. I’m having fun and she’s got all the responsibility. I wanted to be there with her to help her, but this is my dream, this is what I’ve wanted to do forever and things are really evolving in a positive way: We’re playing bigger shows, selling more records. But, at the same time, Nina is at home and suffering, and there’s nothing I could really do about it. So I was torn. I couldn’t satisfy everyone and I couldn’t satisfy myself. Eventually, it came to a head, and that’s why we split up. It was like, “Well fuck this, I can’t do this anymore, it’s driving me insane. I’m not going to quit music, [and I’m] not going to stay home. I can’t do both, so you have to go away.” It was really fucking hard for her. It’s so like a man to be, “OK, you take the kid and go.” And [she] takes all the pain and responsibility, and it’s so like a woman to be able to handle it. I would’ve totally lost my mind, but she’s so strong. She’s a fantastic person. And for her not to hate me after that, I think proves how strong our bond is. I couldn’t think of being with another person, and I don’t think she can either, so she just forgave me and we got back together. All that happened while I was touring for Sunlandic Twins and writing and recording Hissing Fauna. “The Past is a Grotesque Animal” is about our breakup. And that was difficult once we got back together—here’s this record documenting our hard times but it’s only from my perspective. The world only knows my side of the story; they don’t know her side. I think for a while that was kind of hard for her too, me airing out our dirty laundry for the whole world to see. But then, she’s like me, she’s an artist as well, so it’s like, “I understand, that’s what it’s about, you’re an artist.” There are tons of examples of people going through these breakups or tough times and writing about it, and the other side has to deal with it being out there.

Paste: How was your mindset while working on Skeletal Lamping as opposed to the more turbulent times that led to Hissing Fauna?
Barnes: I’m slightly more stable now because I’ve been on anti-depressants for a couple years, and things are a little bit less insane—still insane, but less insane. I think I was in a happier state of mind because I don’t have to worry about money as much, and don’t have to worry about doing my part with Alabee because things have worked out, she’s in school and my mom’s there to help. I just focus on making music. In a way, it’s sort of established now too—it’s a silly thing, until you start making money with music, some people are always going to be like, “Don’t quit your day job.” When [playing music] becomes your primary source of income, people give you more respect and give you more space to do what you need to do. So I take advantage of that and spend as much time as possible working on music.

Paste: The word ‘whimsical’ has been used to describe Of Montreal. It’s even in one of the band’s album titles, and I’ve heard you use that word to describe the music before. What does that word mean to you, and do you think it’s still the best word to describe Of Montreal’s sound and approach?
Barnes: It’s definitely still a pretty good description of the band. When I think back on the earlier records, people would always say we were twee. At the time, I was super annoyed: “How can they say that, it’s not twee; it’s really emotionally heavy and blah blah blah.” But now when I look back, I’m like “Yeah, it is twee, it was twee, that shit was extremely twee.” At the time it really offended me, I didn’t really understand it, which is insane because it just shows how delusional a person can be. Obviously, now, things are a bit heavier emotionally but it’s funny how people have this perception of emotions like, things are light if they’re happy and dark if they’re sad. It’s not necessarily that cut-and-dry. It’s not like something has less value because it’s happy. But for a while I got into that state of mind: I don’t want to make super-happy music because it might seem like it has less legitimacy. [2002's] Aldhils Arboretum was actually the one record I was more influenced by the outside world. While I was writing that, I was trying to make something that seemed slightly more mature than the past records had been. I abandoned that with Satanic Panic and just did what I felt like doing. And now I’m still in that state of mind. [Aldhils] was just a brief departure into that world. It was also at a time when we had been a touring band for a long time, and we were trying to crack the code in a way: How can we do something that we still find creatively interesting, but that doesn’t make people disregard it as twee or preschool music, music for babies.

Paste: You’ve been making music under the name Of Montreal for almost a decade now. When you look back at all these different records and this body of work, how do you feel about it?
Barnes: I never listen to the old records, but I’m happy with them. I’m proud of them. I’m proud of the packaging and the personality of each one. I’m also really happy that each record has its own individuality, but it all works together. I kind of toyed around with the idea of changing the band name for Satanic Panic and closing that chapter and moving on. But I decided it’s cooler to have it all under the same heading. It’s interesting that it’s pretty diverse. When we first started getting [a lot more] people into the band around Satanic Panic and Sunlandic Twins, I knew they weren’t going to like Gay Parade or Coquelicot. It’s very unlikely they would listen to that and be like, “This is awesome.” I think in 20 years time, hopefully, I’ll still be putting out different kinds of records, and still developing as an artist and trying different things. Hopefully, Sunlandic Twins, Hissing Fauna and Skeletal Lamping will be just as foreign to what I’m doing 10 years from now as The Gay Parade is to what I’m doing right now.

Paste: When I was listening to the new record, I was thinking, “you could play a lot of this in a club.” But I bet [Coquelicot’s] “Good Morning Mr. Edmonton” would really clear a place out.
Barnes: Yeah, definitely.

Paste: The name Of Montreal came from a relationship you had with a girl from Montreal.
Barnes: Yeah.

Paste: How much do you still relate to that name? Or is it just something you picked and stuck with?
Barnes: At the time, it made sense, but it was very shortsighted of me to pick a name that was always going to be connected to this relationship I had. At the time, it was the most important thing in my life, but I should’ve known 10 years from that point it wouldn’t really have the same value. [But] I think just the fact that the impetus for calling the band Of Montreal was centered around a life experience—I think that’s still true. Everything I do is centered around my personal experiences. Each record is a time capsule for what I was going through at the time—what I was listening to, what kind of films I was watching, books I was reading, people who were in my life. So I think the name is still appropriate in a way, if you think of it in a broader sense than just a failed relationship.

Paste: Have you ever considering producing records?
Barnes: I’m actually doing my first production job in a couple weeks, with this French band. I’ve never really produced anybody before. I’m kind of excited, but also a bit nervous. I feel kind of like a charlatan even though I’ve self-produced and engineered all [the Of Montreal] records. I feel like I’m not really proficient enough to call myself a producer/engineer. At the same time, I guess I am, I am producing and I am engineering, and if people think it’s OK and they like it, then there’s no reason not to try it. I would really like to do it as long as I’m on the same wavelength with the person. I would want to collaborate with people and be creative in it, and not just sit there and say, “Oh, you want to record guitar now?” and then get up and move the microphone to the guitar. I definitely would want a more hands-on relationship with the band. But I think it would be a lot of fun.

Paste: I heard you were going to be in a new Joe Swanberg film. I guess it starts shooting in September?
Barnes: That has actually been postponed for a while. Originally, I was supposed to do this film with him and then he called me—“Hey, I want to do this other thing.” He’s been working with Noah Baumbach a lot, and he’s like, “We want to do this project that’ll be a bit different.” And then this production job came up with this French band, and I’d rather do that. But I’d definitely like to get into acting at some point, if it was a good role. I’d really like to do something where I could be really freaky, like a Crispin Glover thing.

2009-01-?? - I Heart AU

of Montreal : "I wanted to make a record that destroys that pop template."

Words by Chris Jones

In every self-respecting artist’s career, there comes a time for reinvention. Unless you’re Oasis, you have little chance of long-term survival and critical appreciation unless you take the odd risk; push the boundaries of who you are and what you are capable of. The Beatles, short as their career was, did it several times. Radiohead continue to delight and confound expectation at every turn. But no-one is as synonymous with the idea of complete, fearless reinvention as David Bowie, and Kevin Barnes, who to all intents and purposes is of Montreal, knows this well.

Now on his ninth studio album in 11 years, Barnes is at a creative peak. Of Montreal’s last album, 2007’s masterful Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?, continued his gradual shift from the bright indie-pop of his earlier career to lyrically darker and musically more varied climes. However, 18 months on he is now back with a new album, Skeletal Lamping, and it is immediately obvious that he has no intention of standing still. The musical range is yet broader, encompassing everything from cacophonous guitar noise (‘Nonpareil Of Favor’) and avant-garde freakouts (‘Plastis Wafers’) to his more usual pop, soul and funk. And that’s without mentioning the dizzying sound mosaic he has created, or his decision to perform much of the album in character. On the latter point, Barnes’ Bowie fixation is most marked.

Just as Bowie introduced Ziggy Stardust in 1972 as his career was taking off, so Barnes (albeit on a much smaller commercial scale) introduced the character of Georgie Fruit, a middle-aged black transsexual soul singer, on Hissing Fauna, and he plays a much bigger role on Skeletal Lamping. Barnes says that the title – which first appeared as a lyric on Hissing Fauna track ‘Faberge Falls For Shuggie’ – initially had no meaning.

“At first it wasn’t really about anything,” he says, “it was these two words that popped into my head. I gave it meaning later, and the obvious one that cropped up, to me, was thinking of these skeletons from your closet that you’re bringing to the surface.”

Or shining a light on – the word ‘lamping’ refers to the cruel hunting practice of shining powerful lamps on prey in order that they panic and are therefore easy pickings. The title is an appropriate metaphor for the task of exposing raw, often sexually explicit subject matter, as expressed through the medium of Georgie Fruit. It seems like a bizarre step, but Barnes is happy to admit that Ziggy was a major influence on his decision to introduce a character to his work.

“I think, definitely, I would never have come up with any of this stuff if it wasn’t for people like David Bowie, and Ray Davies and Prince,” he says. “People that created these different personas for themselves and recreated themselves from album to album. Those are the people that I look at and say, ‘This is great’, because there’s always a fear of repeating yourself in music. You put out five or six records and there’s a tendency for people to get trapped in this one thing that they think defines them as an artist or a band or whatever, and I found that that very limiting; I never want to do that. So it’s great to see these other people that are willing to take chances and really do different things throughout their careers. It’s almost like they become different artists in different periods, and they can be different people.”

Georgie’s libidinous stamp is all over Skeletal Lamping. From the stark proclamation, “I’m just a black shemale / And I don’t know what you people are all about” on ‘Wicked Wisdom’, followed swiftly by the strident “We can do it softcore if you want / But you should know I take it both ways” (‘For Our Elegant Caste’), we are left in no doubt as to who we are dealing with. For Barnes, creating Georgie was a form of escapism after the struggles with depression, medication and his faltering marriage that had blighted him and provided much of the lyrical inspiration for Hissing Fauna.

“He sprouted up around the time of my depression period,” he explains. “When I was coming out of [that] and becoming slightly more healthy, this little figure sort of popped in my head. It’s kind of abstract and difficult to explain, because it’s not really a split personality situation where it’s like, ‘Georgie Fruit is talking right now’, you know what I mean? It’s almost like a songwriting device.

“Psychologically, I could say that maybe it was a necessary thing that had to happen for me. I was sick of being trapped in this circular, negative spiral where I was obsessing over my internal feelings about whatever, like depression, anxiety, paranoia, suicidal thoughts, all that shit. I was really getting sick of that and wanting to explode and go somewhere new. I think creating this character helped me put all that stuff in the past and move forward and feel, ‘OK, this is fresh, this is exciting, this is different, this is new. It’s not connected at all to that darkness’.”

He is, however, quick to stress that he hasn’t fully assumed the character of Georgie Fruit to the extent that Bowie became Ziggy, conducting press conferences and giving interviews in character. “I don’t want people thinking that Skeletal Lamping is in any way a concept album or that I’m singing from the perspective of this fictional character,” he insists. “It isn’t like that. Creating Georgie Fruit gave me the ability to give a voice to this other aspect of my psyche, and it’s sort of pretentious and difficult to really say it, but I feel this sort of thing was unlocked inside of me, and I gave it a name. It was not really necessary to give it a name, but I think it helped me go to a place that I’ve never been before. It gave me a defence or something.”

So the words on the album are Barnes’s alone, even though he himself has given the character a name and a backstory. Georgie and Kevin are one and the same. Sort of. It’s a confusing and slightly troubling distinction. But maybe he felt like he needed to give himself some distance in order to be able to tackle his sexuality in such a fearless and often alarming way. The album is peppered with references to sex, often with outrageously comedic effect. To imagine these words coming from a skinny, floppy-haired, 34-year-old white man is frankly bizarre, but it’s a topic that he felt inexorably – and involuntarily – drawn to.

“I didn’t really decide to do it, I just felt compelled to do it,” he insists. “I try to work that way, I try not to second-guess myself or direct myself in any way, really just let whatever the organic, creative spirit wants to happen, happen. I did realise that, ‘OK, this is a pretty sexual record’, but it didn’t bother me or anything.”

With the record having leaked months before its October release date, Barnes has had plenty of time to gauge the online response from the band’s devoted fanbase and the media. With of Montreal’s status as one of the biggest underground bands in the world, and with such a huge back catalogue for fans to get their teeth into, there is no shortage of discussion online. Reviews have largely positive, though the critical acclaim hasn’t been as deafening and unanimous as that which greeted Hissing Fauna. Nevertheless, the fan response has largely been excellent, and Barnes has clearly been keeping an eye on it.

“So far it’s been really good,” he says. “Initially, when I was making it, I was a bit nervous that people would be not as into it or not prepared for it. But then I realised that it’s not really that far-out. It’s not really that shocking, so I didn’t really give people enough credit. It’s not completely out-there. The only thing that’s really unconventional about it is addressing bisexuality in a very open way. There’s so many really heterosexual songs, and then there’s new things sprouting up like “I kissed a girl and I liked it” or whatever. It was just the spirit of the time, people were becoming more open-minded to those sort of things.”

Though Barnes is married, his flamboyant, androgynous image – coupled with the new album’s lyrical content – begs the question as to how he defines his own sexuality, especially as he hasn’t chosen to disassociate himself from his latest set of lyrics.

“I don’t really try to say I’m this or I’m that,” he says, matter-of-factly. “I don’t even necessarily think it’s healthy to define yourself in that way. You might have characteristics of one thing or another from one day at a time, and if you’re open-minded I guess you could say you’re bisexual. So I guess I could say I’m bisexual, but I’ve never dated a guy. I’ve never had a long-term relationship with a guy, so I can’t really say that. But maybe, 10 years from now, I will.”

Aside from Georgie and the fixation with sex, a third aspect of Skeletal Lamping has set tongues wagging – the music mosaic alluded to earlier. Rampant eclecticism has long been a feature of of Montreal’s records, but here that approach is taken to its logical conclusion, and applied not just to an hour-long record, but to four-minute songs. We had fair warning of this last year, when Barnes stated in an interview with an Australian website: “I am going to create a bunch of 30-to-50-second sections and string them all together. I don’t think there will be any pauses between pieces. I want it to feel like one long piece with hundreds of movements.”

He has been almost as good as his word. Coherent songs do appear from time to time (first single ‘Id Engager’, ‘An Eluardian Instance’, the excellent Seventies piano rock pastiche ‘And I’ve Seen A Bloody Shadow’), but throughout the rest of the album, ideas come and go with bewildering speed. Hooks, lyrical ideas and melodies threaten to burrow into your brain before, tantalisingly, being snatched away. It’s a frustrating experience, but strangely addictive and reminiscent of bands like Wire, the Minutemen and Guided By Voices (who Barnes specifically cites as an inspiration). The difference is, those bands finished the song when the idea was up. Barnes doesn’t; he just heads straight into the next musical motif without finishing the “song”. Why do it?

“Mainly just to create an interesting arrangement,” he reasons. “I feel like a lot of songwriters use repetition out of laziness, or just because that’s the conventional thing to do. You know, pop songs can be so predictable and, to me, they lose their value when they’re like that. It’s like you know exactly what’s going to happen, and it’s just boring. So I wanted to make a record that destroys that pop template. It’s kind of arbitrary – I could easily have put the track markers anywhere. It’s not like these four sections work any better than these six sections, but it’s kind of fun too when you’re open in that way – anything goes and you can do any sort of tempo changes or key changes or musical style changes, wherever you want to do it. I really tried to keep it interesting for myself.”

All the same, Barnes acknowledges that this approach might infuriate some listeners, who hear a glorious 30-second section and fantasise about Barnes turning it into fully-fledged, three minute pop song. “Yeah, I can definitely see that. Going back to David Bowie, he has that record Low, where he fades the song out. He makes a one minute song, or a minute-and-a-half or whatever, that’s so amazing and you want it to go on for another two minutes. But it’s kind of sweet in that way that it’s short and you go, ‘Aw, I want to hear it again!’, so you go back and listen to it again. There’s something to say about not getting what you want, but getting a taste of it.” Leave them wanting more? “Yeah, like if you get some dessert or something that’s so delicious, but you only get three bites. But if you’d had 10 bites, you would’ve been sick of it.”

Talking to Barnes even for a short time, it is very apparent that he is borderline obsessive about music. With such a prolific record over the last decade, that’s no surprise. However, he is also refreshingly – unduly – modest about his capabilities as a songwriter, musician, performer and producer. When asked if he feels unable to limit his sound, a sound that has touched upon so many different styles in what is often – by now erroneously – labelled an indie-pop project, his answer is simple:

“I don’t really want to. For me, what’s exciting about making music is pulling all these references together. I don’t really think of myself as terribly original. All I’m really doing is taking all these other people’s good ideas and putting them together in my own way. That’s all I can really do.”

That said, he knows that if this is all he can do (and it plainly isn’t), he is among the best around at it. He doesn’t offer any doubt that he will have the opportunity to keep making music for as long as he wants, and he sees himself doing it into old age, as his heroes have done.

“I look at people like Robert Wyatt or Fela Kuti, people that never really stop making interesting music. There’s plenty of people who have really long careers, but they’re completely irrelevant because they stopped taking chances and they just keep spinning out the same crap over and over again. I don’t want to be like that. For me, my main goal is to always stay excited and to continue moving, and developing and changing, and doing different things. Kind of like what David Bowie did. He went through so many different periods and so many different phases, and he’s left the world with so much to dissect and go through and explore. That’s definitely my goal.”

Skeletal Lamping is out now on Polyvinyl

2008-10-16 - Gigwise

In Glorious Technicolor - Of Montreal

by Jonathan Sebire

Stepping into the brisk autumnal wind that whips across Regents Park the sound of hand claps, harmonies and acoustic guitars races towards you. Upon closer inspection the scene reveals quixotic indie visionaries Of Montreal, Kevin Barnes' merry ensemble completed by Bryan Poole, Dottie Alexander, Jamey Huggins, Davey Pierce and Ahmed Gallab, giving an impromptu performance for some assembled cameras. It's an indie postcard scene with the band clearly having a lot of fun being in each others company on their press junket for latest LP ' Skeletal Lamping'. Later, over a cup of green tea, band founder and front man Barnes discusses the genesis of this latest album alongside the bands attempted resuscitation of the live music spectacle, love of the Prince legacy and the shadows of prescription medication and THAT advert.

In person Barnes cuts a lithe, svelte figure, dressed in regal purple he seems the perfect physical embodiment of his noted Prince obsession. 'Skeletal Lamping' follows hot on the heels of 2007s 'Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer'. “At the time I didn't really think about it this way but in retrospect I can see that it was really influenced by a combination of things, first off a spirit that I was following on the 'Hissing Fauna' tour, this very liberated state of mind and going into this very sexual, funky direction. So I took that into the song writing process, and also, the big one I guess is the backlash from this commercial”, notes Kevin when considering the genesis of 'Skeletal Lamping'.

Whilst this first reason would seem obvious enough, one of modern music's great showman Kevin has frequently performed nude and incorporated erotic elements into the bands music, the latter is a more abstract influence. In 2007, an Aussie themed restaurant chain, Outback Steakhouse, licensed Of Montreal's 2005 song 'Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games' to include in its new ad campaign. Though they threw in some didgeridoo and changed the words the advert dragged Of Montreal into the collective mainstream conscious, not only as an associate of prime Aussie ribs but also, for their fanatical cult indie following, as artist willing to bend over and be branded with that indie-cool death rattle; the 'sell-out' chants. It is something that clearly had a great effect on Barnes, he was distraught enough to post a Conrad Keely style essay on the nature of music and the impossible standards set by the 70's DIY community, and something that he has had to wrestle with. “I think I've gotten past that, I mean we are actually playing that song live now. For a long time we couldn't play it because it was just too weird and we'd get heckled. But we've taken it back and it doesn't feel too weird now. We've paid our penance or whatever. The whole situation behind that was so bizarre anyway, I just found myself being called a sell-out and having to question, 'well am I?' so it was weird and hard. It's definitely a lot easier when no one talks about you or writes about you - that's why I never self Google.”

Alongside the funkier sexual elements of the bands persona (check their blog to see pictures of Kevin virtually nude on horseback in NYC last weekend), one overriding influence on 'Skeletal Lamping' is the zeitgeist forming 'Smile' album by Brian Wilson. “Well I can look back and say that the Beach Boys' 'Smile' was the first time I realised the potential of a song. Like it didn't have to follow a linear path, or a template in any way. 'Sign Of The Times' by Prince is such a varied record, there's so many types of songs and it's a long record, you go on such a strange journey. That's so impressive to me because every song is different, I mean it's in the same ball park but it could almost be different songwriters and that's what I love about Prince as he's one man but he can write as so many different voices.”

Writing in different voices is definitely something that has struck a cord with Barnes as he seeks to extend the musical journey with Of Montreal. Included on 'Skeletal lamping' are songs in the voice of the character Georgie Fruit, a multiple sex change ex funk band black singer, who first appeared on 'Hissing Fauna'. “The whole Georgie Fruit character was just something that happened, it sounds pretentious but it's true I didn't really think about it. These songs just sort of happen and then afterwards I have to answer for them almost”, chuckles Barnes.

In conversation Barnes is incredibly engaging, articulate figure, he also seems relaxed and self assured, something that will no doubt delight his expanding legion of fans as he has in the past made no secret of both his battle with depression and suicidal thoughts as well as his haphazard relation ship with the mood levelling prescription medication Cymbalta. He has in past interviews talked about enjoying the roller coaster emotional effect that taking the medication in a less than linear manner produces. “Well you know I used to get really angry, it was kind of like 'well why am I still so confused and mesed up Shouldn't I have it together by now?' You think that OK I feel messed up and it's something that you never get used to it and it used to bother me. But now I'm like 'well it's OK to be messed up and have these anxieties and be paranoid or whatever and be a bit neurotic',” muses Barnes, before adding to the question of whether he thinks he may ever deliberately seek this kind of roller coaster in order to help him create, “I think it helps me because it's a feeling where you become more abstract you know. Because it gives you a drive. It gives me a drive to create. It gives me something to feel that spirit.”

One of the key elements to the Of Montreal experience is the live show that accompanies their indie funk party. This tour Barnes and the band have sought to push themselves beyond anything they have attempted before. “Well of course there's Prince, the tours that he did around the time of 'LoveSexy' and 'Sign Of The Times' where everyone in the band is just the best, like the best musicians, but then there's this whole other level where there?d be stuff going on with the keyboard player Cat and they had performance artist on stage who didn't even play an instrument doing different things.”

For Of Montreal this other level involves a multitude of ostentatious showmanship involving western style shoot outs, gay porn and horses on stage. “Well what we started to do was like a Michel Gondry inspired High School Musical theme. So we'd have these ridiculous skits and costumes, like we have a centaur costume I get inside. There's stuff like Satyr's and Medieval wenches. Some people don't like that other stuff. But for us it's like well you already have the music and you can listen to that and get whatever you need to out of that by listening to the record. When we perform live we just want it to hit on another level. We want to defeat that static image you get at most shows. Maybe I have a short attention span but even if I love a band after 5 songs I'm getting bored. We want to over stimulate people like a great or complex movie so that people are remembering different aspects a week after the show.”

Reaching other levels on both record and live is not something that Of Montreal could ever be accused of not doing. It's flippant to label working artists with the genius moniker yet in Barnes modern music has a modern day visionary who manages to decompartmentalise music, theatre and genuine experience into something all too rare.

2008-05-01 - Eye Weekly

Kevin Barnes BY Sarah Liss
May 01, 2008 11:05

You’d have to be a bit daft to think Toronto’s hurting for music festivals, but since enterprising boy wonder Eric Warner quietly launched the prototype version of his Over The Top Fest in 2002, there’s been something particularly special about the local impresario’s springtime romp. Warner’s been adamant about keeping his shows all ages, even though finding suitable venues can be a headache, and he strives to book left-field acts. You always have a sense that the fest has been curated by a passionate music fan who’s not afraid to get his hands dirty.

This year Warner and film curator Jeff Wright have expanded the film component considerably (see page 18); if all goes well, next year’s version will include theatre and dance. But independent music is still at the core of OTT, and this year’s roster of live shows — which run today (May 1) through Sunday (May 4) and take place at the Whippersnapper Gallery, St. Stephen-in-the-Fields Church, Sneaky Dee’s, The Mod Club and Ukula — is incredibly strong.

In addition to a rare live appearance by beat-driven minimalist legends Silver Apples (they play May 1 at the Music Gallery), here are a handful of OTT concerts that shouldn’t be missed.

One of these unmissables is an unconventional solo appearance by Of Montreal frontman Kevin Barnes. We tracked down the psych-pop visionary, who took time from working on Of Montreal’s forthcoming album Skeletal Lamping to answer some questions about his inimitable aesthetic.

You’re famous for your theatrical performances. Are you planning anything special for this solo show? You performed nude in Vegas last year — how can you beat that?
Well, the only alternative to playing nude is playing with your clothes on, and I don’t plan on stripping down, picking up an acoustic guitar and doing a solo show. I don’t put pressure on myself to entertain people.

You’re clearly someone who embraces androgyny and gender-bending — I’m thinking about your live performances and also comments you’ve made in past interviews about raiding your wife’s closet. Has that always been part of your life?
I think about gender roles a lot. Growing up, I always felt very feminine. I always felt different from the other boys. It wasn’t even a sexual thing — I just couldn’t relate to anything macho or overtly masculine. I never wanted to be that way. As a young boy, I identified way more with Prince than I did my own parents or friends. I’ve never felt compelled to cross-dress in private — I don’t even believe that cross-dressing is possible, since I don’t believe there are clothes that only women can wear or fashion that’s only for men. I don’t care about many social rules like that. I’m amazed that being nude in public is so scandalous and even criminal. In a way, it’s sort of cute how we, as a species, cling to these meaningless rules of conduct. I consider myself a member of the fourth gender. It’s not a physical state; it’s emotional. It’s a powerful place to be.

I’ve always identified with feminine male artists like David Bowie, Lou Reed, Marc Bolan and Prince. I love how they transcend gender expectations without sinking too far into campiness — it’s a fine line for sure. I used to wish I were homosexual... I romanticized about it. I don’t like all the bullshit that “real” men are supposed to aspire towards. The thing is, unfortunately, I’m not really attracted to most men sexually. I’d much rather make out with a woman. Plus I realized there’s just as much bullshit in the gay communities; like Sartre said, “hell is other people.”

Some of the themes you addressed on last year’s Hissing Fauna (depression, suicide, isolation) were extremely dark. Does writing about such intense autobiographical material make you feel a bit too naked?
It’s not hard performing the songs ‘cause the subjects are things I’ve dealt with, and continue to deal with, every day. They haven’t lost their relevance for me. In a way, it’s easier to sing songs about heavier subjects than happier subjects, just ’cause I’m more often in a sort of pensive and freaked-out state of mind.

2008-11-12 - Dallas Music

Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes Runs Up Against Polite Indie Rock, Outback Steakhouse and Norway

By Kevin O'Donnell
Published on November 12, 2008 at 11:16am

Kevin Barnes has contemplated suicide. Two years ago, the frontman for indie-pop institution Of Montreal moved to Norway with his wife to raise their newborn daughter, Alabee. The weather was shitty, he was living apart from his family and friends in a strange country, and his new family suddenly forced him to face the uncomfortable truth of adulthood.

"I was in such a bad state of mind that I couldn't see anything positive," says the 34-year-old. "There was just lows. Nothing was beautiful."

He tried yoga, meditation and psychiatry to cure his depression. Nothing worked.

"It was like you're bleeding to death," Barnes recalls, "and someone hands you a Kleenex and says, 'Here, put this on.' "

So Barnes threw himself into his music, writing most of last year's Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, a bizarre, brilliant set of whacked-out psychedelic synth-pop that explored his twisted psyche. And this month, the frontman and his crew—Bryan Poole, Dottie Alexander, Jamey Huggins, Davey Pierce and Ahmed Gallab—return with Skeletal Lamping, which, while not as dark as its predecessor, is definitely crazier. It's a jaw-droppingly great 15-song explosion that features burbling synth dirges; horn rave-ups; sweaty disco bangers; cacophonous noise-rock explosions; and party-starting, Prince-style funk. It's also one of the funniest records you'll hear all year, with Barnes delivering explicit ruminations on sex, gender politics and relationships. "We can do it soft-core if you want/But you should know I take it both ways," he proclaims in sweet falsetto on "Our Elegant Caste." And on "Wicked Wisdom," he unleashes non-P.C. nuggets like "Why is it white girls don't ever have any ideas?"

"I really enjoy eccentric '70s soul, where people sing stuff like, 'If you want to get with me, you've got to get on your knees and crawl to me,'" Barnes explains. "So I'm pushing myself to make outsider art that's very provocative and bizarre. I want to grab people and have them say either, 'I love this' or 'This is bullshit!'

"I feel like with indie rock, everything is so gentle and polite."

It's taken Barnes a while to come to that realization.

Soon after he formed Of Montreal in 1997, he became part of Athens, Georgia's Elephant Six Collective of bands such as Neutral Milk Hotel and Apples in Stereo—precisely the style of "gentle" indie he rebels against today. Even his band's earliest records—including 1997's Cherry Peel and 1999's The Gay Parade—were fairly conventional, Beatles-style rock records.

But Barnes still found E6 to be a much-needed support group for his band: "If we were by ourselves, we probably would've broken up," he now says. "But knowing that our friends supported us and that they loved us, it made us feel empowered."

In 2004, Barnes started writing and recording the band's records largely by himself; his craft noticeably improved on that year's Satanic Panic in the Attic and 2005's The Sunlandic Twins.

After the latter release, Barnes was approached by Outback Steakhouse to use the quasi-funky number "Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games" for a commercial. Barnes, who couldn't afford an attorney to help negotiate the terms of the contract, agreed. But when the commercial finally aired, the company altered the lyrics from "Let's pretend we don't exist" to "Let's go Outback tonight." Of course, Barnes was furious.

But he was also inspired: "I never had to deal with anyone ever calling me a sellout," he says. "It's funny, too, because I feel like it helped motivate me to make music that was more out there and interesting. The backlash was a good thing."

There'd be no Skeletal Lamping—and maybe no Barnes—without it.

2008-10-14 - The Village Voice

Of Montreal Trades Polite Beatles Worship for a Flashy Prince Fixation
Kevin Barnes loves loincloths and horses. Outback Steakhouse? Not so much.
By Kevin O'Donnell
Tuesday, October 14th 2008 at 3:01pm




Kevin Barnes has contemplated suicide. Two years ago, the frontman for indie-pop institution Of Montreal moved to Norway with his wife to raise their newborn daughter, Alabee. The weather was shitty, he was living apart from his family and friends in a strange country, and his new family suddenly forced him to face the uncomfortable truth of adulthood. "I was in such a bad state of mind that I couldn't see anything positive," says the 34-year-old. "There was just lows. Nothing was beautiful." He tried yoga, meditation, and psychiatry to cure his depression. Nothing worked. "It was like you're bleeding to death," Barnes recalls, "and someone hands you a Kleenex and says, 'Here, put this on.' "

So Barnes threw himself into his music, writing most of last year's Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, a bizarre, brilliant set of whacked-out psychedelic synth-pop that explored his twisted psyche. And this month, the frontman and his crew—Bryan Poole, Dottie Alexander, Jamey Huggins, Davey Pierce, and Ahmed Gallab—return with Skeletal Lamping, which, while not as dark as its predecessor, is definitely crazier: a jaw-droppingly-great 15-song explosion that features burbling synth dirges, horn rave-ups, sweaty disco bangers, cacophonous noise-rock explosions, and party-starting, Prince-style funk. It's also one of the funniest records you'll hear all year, with Barnes delivering explicit ruminations on sex, gender politics, and relationships: "We can do it soft-core if you want/But you should know I take it both ways," he proclaims in sweet falsetto on "Our Elegant Caste." And on "Wicked Wisdom," he unleashes non-p.c. nuggets like "Why is it white girls don't ever have any ideas?"

"I really enjoy eccentric '70s soul, where people sing stuff like, 'If you want to get with me, you've got to get on your knees and crawl to me,' " Barnes explains. "So I'm pushing myself to make outsider art that's very provocative and bizarre. I want to grab people and have them say either, 'I love this' or 'This is bullshit!' I feel like with indie rock, everything is so gentle and polite."

It's taken Barnes a while to come to that realization. Soon after he formed Of Montreal in 1997, he became part of Athens, Georgia's Elephant Six Collective of bands like Neutral Milk Hotel and Apples in Stereo—precisely the style of "gentle" indie that he rebels against today. Even the band's earliest records—including 1997's Cherry Peel and 1999's The Gay Parade—were conventional, Beatles-style rock records. But Barnes found E6 to be a much-needed support group. "If we were by ourselves, we probably would've broken up," he says. "But knowing that our friends supported us and that they loved us, it made us feel empowered."

In 2004, Barnes started writing and recording the band's records largely by himself; his craft noticeably improved on that year's Satanic Panic in the Attic and 2005's The Sunlandic Twins. After the latter release, Barnes was approached by Outback Steakhouse to use the quasi-funky number "Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games" for a commercial. Barnes, who couldn't afford an attorney to help negotiate the terms of the contract, agreed. But when the commercial finally aired, the company altered the lyrics from "Let's pretend we don't exist" to "Let's go Outback tonight." Of course, he was furious—but also inspired. "I never had to deal with anyone ever calling me a sellout," he says. "It's funny, too, because I feel like it helped motivate me to make music that was more out there and interesting. The backlash was a good thing."

The money has certainly helped Of Montreal stay afloat. The band still receives a yearly royalty check for $33,000, which helps finance their over-the-top concerts. These days, Of Montreal are one of the best live bands going. Friday night, the group did a sold-out Roseland Ballroom gig featuring stage risers, movie projections, glam-rock costumes, a cover of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit," and a sequence where a crew pretends to hang Barnes with a noose. Plus, since this is New York, they went one step further: Barnes got nearly naked and rode around the stage on a white stallion. He'd also hoped to shave his head and eyebrows and cover his entire body in red paint, but at the last minute, he opted to go just with the paint. "It takes a really long time for your hair to grow back," Barnes says. "I chickened out."

Fittingly enough, Prince happened to be performing an intimate show on the rooftop of the Gansevoort Hotel that same night. So after his own gig, Barnes tagged along as the plus-one of MGMT frontman Andrew VanWyngarden. (The longtime friends are collaborating on a side project dubbed Blikk Fang.) Barnes has long been a fan of Prince; he compares Skeletal Lamping to "Sign 'O the Times, Lovesexy, and The Black Album all together." So to see his idol live for the first time in such an intimate setting was an absolute blast. "There's a Prince song called 'The Ballad of Dorothy Parker' that I think is definitely one of the best pop songs ever written," Barnes raves. "I feel like that one song has inspired so many other songs for me." While it's not like Prince and Barnes are pals, it's certainly something Barnes hopes for. "If Prince contacted me and told me he liked my music," he says, "it would just mean the world to me."

2007-03-?? - Chicago Innerview

The Universal Experience of Depression.


If band biographies have taught us anything, it’s that one’s career success is often inversely proportional to the success of one’s interpersonal relationships. Sure, it’s a laughable music biz cliché — the climb up the ladder (or the charts, as it were) heralding the downward spiral, with the whiskey bottle only revealing its projectile properties until after the sold-out show — but that doesn’t mean these things can’t (and don't) really happen.

Take Kevin Barnes, creative core of Athens, Georgia’s Of Montreal, who perfected his sunny candy-coated synth-pop sound on 2005's infectious Sunlandic Twins, only to then battle depression and a separation with his girlfriend, Nina, and his now two-year-old daughter, Alabee. Meanwhile, Of Montreal was becoming a critical darling and playing sold-out shows across the country. While Barnes’ tale may not be of What’s Love Got to Do With It proportions, Barnes, unlike Tina Turner, was able to mend his wounded personal life and take a great artistic step forward in the process.

BARNES' INNER VIEW
“I started to totally freak out. I had this really serious, kind of like the very beginnings of this insane chemical depression period. It was, like, insane and almost led me to kill myself...”


The recently released Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? (Polyvinyl Records) is Of Montreal’s most introspective effort to date, but, thankfully, the bright harmonies and rhythmic fun that has become the band’s fingerprint isn’t lost along the way. Barnes pours his heart out, but only so we can dance happily along. Chicago Innerview called Barnes during a tour stop in Las Vegas to discuss how everything from anxiety to antidepressants to alter egos factored into his band’s newest album.

Chicago Innerview: Can you talk about what you were going through when you were writing and recording Hissing Fauna?
Kevin Barnes: The very first part of the record I wrote before my daughter was born. I was living in Norway because my girlfriend is Norwegian and we didn’t have health insurance because we thought it would make more sense — because they have socialized medicine in Norway — to have our daughter over there. So we’re living in Norway and I started to totally freak out. I had this really serious, kind of like the very beginnings of this insane chemical depression period. It was, like, insane and almost led me to kill myself. So all the early songs like 'Cato as a Pun' and 'Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse' and 'A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger' — all those songs were written and recorded while I was living in Norway, during the beginning of that really insane period, using the very limited resources that I had — just a laptop, a MIDI-keyboard and a microphone. At the same time, right after my daughter was born, I went on tour in support of Sunlandic Twins because that record had just come out. I had this newborn baby that was like two or three months old and I had to leave my daughter and girlfriend back in Athens, Georgia. It was really difficult for me because the band was taking off at that point. We were sort of finally reaching a larger audience and feeling like all our hard work, all our paid dues were sort of paying off. But at the same time, I couldn’t really enjoy it because I knew that I was putting my girlfriend and my daughter in a crazy situation. I just basically abandoned both of them to go on tour and pursue music. Everything was just on fire, exploding all around me. So then my girlfriend and I split up and she went back to Norway with our daughter and I kept touring.

Chicago Innerview: Had you experienced depression before?
Kevin Barnes: No, never. That was the thing. It totally just hit me. I had never ever seen anything like it. And coming from this sort of blue-collar background, my parents never accepted depression as a real affliction or as a real physical thing. It was just basically like, ‘If you’re depressed you need to just pull yourself together. You can do it. Don’t be weak.’ So I had to kind of cast that aside and go, 'Okay, I have a problem and this is something that I need to face and I need to fix. If I’m smart about it, then I’ll be able to recover from it. If I’m stupid, then I’ll either get into serious drugs or just try to find some type of escape.' That’s why a lot of the songs, or some of the songs, make reference to spiritual longing, you know, like desperate for something to sort of help me. I needed help, but nothing was helping. You know, no conversation is going to help, no therapy, no drinking or drugs, no exercise, eating healthy, yoga — I went through all that stuff and none of it helped. And then, luckily, I got on antidepressants and that did help.

CI: Were you afraid the medicine would inhibit your creative impulses?
KB: It hasn’t turned me into a zombie. I was worried it was going to make me like a numb person and not feel anything emotionally. Luckily, I was on a pretty low dose of this thing called Cymbalta, which I still take, but I take it like every other day. And to some degree it made me more detached when I was taking it everyday. I was on the medicine before my girlfriend and I split up, and I think that being on the medicine just made me feel like, 'Okay, I don’t really care. I can’t help you right now and it doesn’t bother me right now because I’m on medicine.' So we split up. That’s what 'The Past Is a Grotesque Animal' is about — the split-up, that time apart not knowing if we were going to get back together and freaking out, to some degree, about that.

CI: Lyrically, Hissing Fauna reflects your experience with your separation and depression, but musically it’s a very jovial record. Like on 'A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger' you’re candidly singing about a nervous breakdown over keyboards that sound like the soundtrack to a bike ride on a warm, sunny day.
KB: Well, I was relying on music in a way that I haven’t really in the past, sort of using it as a form of therapy. It was the only real escapism afforded to me that actually helped in any way. I wasn’t really writing songs and then going into the studio after I had worked out the arrangements. For the first time I was composing everything in the studio, in the moment as this form of therapy. So all the songs up until 'The Past is a Grotesque Animal' were written when we were still together. I wrote 'The Past is a Grotesque Animal' after we broke up. And then the songs after 'The Past is a Grotesque Animal' I wrote after we had gotten back together. So that’s why the music on Hissing Fauna, a lot of times, doesn’t really make sense with the lyrical subject matter. I was trying to create something that was more buoyant and upbeat and happier-sounding to lift my spirits, rather than create something that matched my mood, which wouldn’t really help me anyway because it would just reinforce this darkness that I really didn’t want to be a part of anyway. I was just trying to create something that was a bit more optimistic and positive and hopeful musically, but then when it came to the lyrics, there was no way I could really fake that sort of thing. I couldn’t really say, ‘Oh, life is grand,’ you know?

CI: I’ve heard the second part of the album is also about you reinventing yourself as Georgie Fruit. Was this alter ego another part of your escape?
KB: It’s definitely a strange occurrence. To some degree, I have always experimented with different recording personas and stage personas. But this new character, Georgie Fruit, definitely sprung forth after the breakup with Nina and the reconciliation and all that. He’s like this middle-aged, black, she-male with a checkered past; he’s been to prison a couple times and he was in a band called Arousal in the late-‘70s. I created a pretty thorough backstory for this character, so he seems very real to me. It, in a way, enabled me to breathe life to this different aspect to my personality, my creative spirit.

CI: Now that you’re doing better, is it going to be tough to relive the Hissing Fauna material night after night on tour?
KB: Unless I just completely go through the motions, I’m going to have to relive the inspiration for those songs. But it also translates into something more positive when you are performing it with your friends in front of an audience of people that are, ostensibly, nice and cool and supportive and can also somewhat identify with universal experiences like depression and suicidal thoughts and intense anxiety.

Of Montreal :: with Walter Meego :: Metro :: March 15.