Aureate Gloom
Kevin Barnes’ formal restlessness is his charm and flaw. It has made Of Montreal an ever-morphing, rarely boring indie-rock standby — but it can also find him riffling through random scraps like Macklemore in a Goodwill superstore. So goes Barnes’ latest: Impressive disco-funk-glam couplings (the politically incensed “Bassem Sabry”) rush the dance floor alongside Anglophile post-punk and classic-rock fractals (the Kinks-conjuring “Apollyon of Blue Room”). Sometimes his hydrant flow of ideas reveals a lack of good ones (see the proggy slog “Monolithic Egress”). But when Barnes figures out how to focus his brain dumps, dude gets more with less.