Report: Of Montreal Live in D.C.

The shape-shifting indie rockers, led by flamboyant frontman Kevin Barnes, blow things up real good at the 9:30 Club on January 28.

By Matt Siblo / Photos By Kyle Gustafson

One band's ostentatious is another's austerity. Such was the case with Of Montreal's performance at the 9:30 club Thursday night, just a little over a year since its last stop at the venue. As the band's popularity has grown, its outlandishly surreal stage show has mirrored lead singer Kevin Barnes' loopy psychedelic narratives. While promoting 2008's Skeletal Lamping, band members were tiered on a cluttered stage amidst elaborate conceptual set pieces and hyperactive interpretative dancers. Though tonight's nearly 20-song set wasn't exactly lacking for spectacle- what with the molesting bishops and mock-crucifixion- it didn't feel quite as overstuffed. This is a recession, after all.

Barnes' metamorphosis resulting from the harrowing events leading up to 2007's Hissing Fauna... is now old news, but his brash hyper-sexualized stage persona remains electrifying to watch.  Slinking around the stage dressed like a matador transvestite, his complete absence of super-ego is both fetching and bizarre. On stage, Barnes transforms into Georgie Fruit, a 40-year-old African-American funk singer who has had numerous sex changes. To see him, it comes dangerously close to making sense.  As the rest of the band, accompanied by costumed ghouls and animals, paraded around the stage like extras from H.R. Puffinstuf, its deliriousness turned infectious and the largely underage crowd lapped up every outlandish diversion.

But even as Of Montreal's set was swifter than its previous jaunt-it's hard to maintain a sugar rush for 2 full hours- it occasionally turned listless. Barnes announced that the band would be releasing a new album in September, but it previewed only one new song, the mid-tempo "Metal finds Troll," hardly resembling the new Parliament-inspired direction Barnes has been feeding the press.  On songs like "A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger" and a ferocious rendition of "She's a Rejecter," the band reasserted itself, proving that underneath the pomp and confetti, its melodies are just as engrossing as its gimmicks.    

For its encore, Of Montreal regrouped for a well-intentioned if not quite successful cover of The Jackson Five's "I Want You Back."  Even Barnes, the mercurial interloper that he is, couldn't strike a post-modern pose recreating the magic of its source material. 

[Photos credit: Kyle Gustafson:  http://photokyle.com/photoblog/]