Title: Hissing fauna, are you the destroyer?
Artiste: Of Montreal
Year: 2007
Chronological position: Eighth album
Previous experience of this artiste?: Zero
Why is this considered a classic? I have no idea
My thoughts
One minute (or thereabouts in) ---- Good, great, bad, meh, still waiting or other? Good
One track in --- Good
Halfway through --- Good
Finished --- Good but also Huh?
Comments: On first glance and on the face of it this just seems too weird for me. From the crazy, seemingly nonsensical question in the title to the idea that frontman and creator Kevin Barnes metamorphoses into a black shemale called Georgie Fruit … well let’s just say I’m confused and not holding out too much hope. But Of Montreal get a lot of love around here, so who knows? Anyway it’s down to the music in the end, so what’s that like? Well, the opener is a lot catchier than I expected and I find my head nodding, shades of Bowie in the vocal. Kind of. I see there’s a twelve-minute track at the midpoint of the album, but Of Montreal balance this epic out with another eleven tracks that all run from the three to four minute mark.In fact, the Divine Comedyesque “Sink the Seine” is just over one minute long.
“Heimdalsgate like a Promethan curse” (what?) starts sort of new-wave with a dash of Krautrock but then becomes a more straightahead pop/rock song with some nice synth and piano, sort of Cars feel to it. “Gronlandic edit” (again, what?) has a cool bassline and is quite funky with again a twist of Krautrock to go, while “A sentence of sorts in Kongsvinger” (once again, what?) keeps the funk going with a riff on the synth that sounds right out of George McCrae’s “Rock your baby” while also doling out a generous dollop of dream pop.
The “turning point” of the album apparently is the just short of twelve-minute epic “The past is a grotesque animal” in which Kevin turns into Georgie, and will remain as his “alter ego” for the next two albums. Hey, what do I know? It’s certainly darker and moves away from the poppy side of the first half of the album to a more sort of progressive idea, much rockier and probably my favourite so far. Very 70s Bowie, puts me in mind of the likes of “Suffragette City”; runs on more or less the same musical phrase all through and yet never gets boring. The Bowie influence gets a lot more evident after this, with “Bunny ain’t no kind of rider” and “Faberge falls for Shuggie” with a nice 60s/70s keyboard sound. Kind of experimental on the latter.
Touch of Prince in “Labyrinthian pomp” (I’ve given up on the titles) and it’s pretty psychedlic. Like the outro to “She’s a rejecter”, but the Bowie rip-off vocal is starting to grate by now.
Favourite track(s): Suffer for fashion, Sink the Seine, A sentence of sorts in Kongsvinger, The past is a grotesque animal
Least favourite track(s): None of the other tracks are bad
per se, I just wasn’t as impressed by them as the ones above
Final impression --- Wha--?
Do I feel, at the end, A) I wish I had listened to this sooner
B) I'm sorry I bothered
C) I might end up liking this
D) Have to wait and see
E) Bit underwhelmed; was ok but a classic?
F) Definitely enjoyed it, but again would I consider it a classic?
G) Enjoyed this album just purely on its own merits
H) Glad I listened to it
D, or possibly none of the above. This is one weird album. Good musically, but very hard to understand or get my head around. Feel like I’ve tripped out on acid, and I’ve never even smoked tobacco ….