Grade: 69% (D)
I have recently been thrown into the of Montreal discography after a quick foray into the Pitchfork.tv collection on the band. After a witnessing their live debacle this spring, I was certainly a fan, most notably of their 2007 album Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, but had not yet immersed myself into their sound. However, I have most recently been interested in their latest effort, 2010's False Priest. The pop-iness of the album is spectacularly underground in some way, mainly due to the lyrical uncanniness. While their constant references to sex are enough to grab the attention of an adolescent boy, the scope of their musical depth is interesting to consider.
With "Wintered Depths," it seems as if Kevin Barnes is sampling a little bit from every part of their discography without completely committing to any style. Running over seven and a half minutes, the track starts with the creepy acoustic guitar that is reminiscent of the band's early musings which is quickly slid into the low-fi pop of The Bedside Drama A Petite Tragedy with a hook comparable to one from Hissing Fauna minus the extrenuous bells and whistles. Barnes even tests his classic lyrical ingenuity, singing, "Tried to call you from a bathroom in South Paulo, but I was too drunk to formulate any sort of earthly language."
All of this is pushed to the precipice of each former methodology but extends no boundaries into new territory in under three minutes. You're then sucked back into the darkness of Barnes' eerie voice covered by rehashed pianos. Henceforth it is the quintessential "falling down the rabbit hole" swirling sounds of any psychedelic outfit. The final minute is filled with an attempt to grab back at what was before, but the feeling is that it is simply too late and any effort is futile, resulting in an anti-climactic ending of sorts.
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of Montreal's newest album Paralytic Stalks is out February 7th.
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