Of Montreal -- Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?

Concept album or no, one thing is clear -- this is darker and less sing-along-y than Of Montreal's previous album, The Sunlandic Twins. Kevin Barnes wrote, performed and recorded the 12 songs with help from family and friends. His brother David Barnes usually does artwork, which is worth the cost alone. Track seven, "The Past is a Grotesque Animal" seems like a 12-minute pretentious rant about depression, love and despair. What it really is, though, is Barnes' transformation into his alter ego, Georgie Fruit. He references Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and the song is an epic laden with obscure references (for which Barnes is known) and pain that is evident, especially with lyrics like, "Though our love project has so much potential/But it's like we weren't made for this world/Though I wouldn't really want to meet someone who was." The album sounds like a typical Of Montreal piece of work on the surface, but Barnes, always lyrically poignant, has done something different here -- this is deeper and more meaningful. The band is distinctly eccentric, and their albums will always take you on a trip with crazy sounds and originality that can be compared to a scene from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, where they are in the tunnel on the chocolate river and the lights are spinning and it's crazy-scary. That about sums this up. (Daniele Pfarr) Grade: A+