Kevin Barnes
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Kevin Barnes
Kevin Barnes with of Montreal in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2005
Background information
Genre(s)	Indie pop, Indie rock, Psychedelic pop, electronic, experimental
Occupation(s)	Singer-songwriter, Musician
Instrument(s)	Vocals, guitar, bass guitar, piano, drums
Label(s)	Polyvinyl, Kindercore, Bar/None
Associated acts	of Montreal

Kevin Barnes (born in Rocky River, OH on May 30, 1974) is the singer and songwriter for the indie rock group of Montreal, part of the Athens, Georgia-based Elephant 6 Collective.^[1] Barnes started the band on his own and, although providing several stories as to the origin of the name, is said to have named it after a failed romance with a woman from Montreal. ^[2] The group has recorded nine full-length albums, and numerous EPs and 7" singles.
His brother, David Barnes, is an artist who has designed most of the band's artwork for albums after the release of The Gay Parade.
In 2004, Kevin married Nina Grottland (a former Ethnobabes member ^[3] as well as a graphic artist) Together they have begat their daughter, Alabee (born in Oslo, Norway on December 29th, 2004). His cousin, Chuck Andrews, was a member of Qwasi Qwa and is now the singer/songwriter of the indie rock band Fire Zuave.

of Montreal

Of Montreal consists of musicians Kevin Barnes, Bryan Poole (the Late B.P. Helium), Dottie Alexander, Jamey Huggins, Davey Pierce, and Ahmed Gallab. The group has recorded nine studio albums, beginning with Cherry Peel, and their ninth, Skeletal Lamping, is due to be released on October 7, 2008 on Polyvinyl.^[4] While melodic pop as always been Barnes' primary vehicle, his style has managed to transform significantly since the 1997 release of Cherry Peel. The acoustic tendencies of early albums gradually transformed into a more electronic, funk, and overall eclectic sound. One of the features which often appears in Barnes' songwriting is his penchant for composing upbeat melodies to gloomy lyrics and morose subject matter. At different periods in the band's career he has dealt with subjects both personal and fictional. He is a prolific lyricist with a tendency to employ unusual words and phrases, as well as complicated worldplay.

Lyrics

Kevin Barnes' writing has encompassed many styles over the year. Of Montreal's first album Cherry Peel dealt mainly with personal issues of unrequited love, as in the songs Baby or Montreal, or humourous mundane situations, as in Tim I Wish You Were Born A Girl. His style then shifted to story-telling, often involving dialogues, as in Good Morning Mr. Edminton from the album Coquelicot Asleep In The Poppies : A Variety Of Whimsical Verse or fictional characters, such as Rose Robert or Jacques Lamure, or even fictional mythological creature, like the Efeblum.^[5] The albums The Gay Parade, The Bedside Drama: A Petite Tragedy and Coquelicot Asleep in the Poppies: A Variety of Whimsical Verse are constructed as concept albums, reminiscent of the works of some progressive rock icons of the 70's, such as David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust or Genesis' The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. But by 2004, Kevin Barnes was starting to revert to more personal lyrics, even incorporating the names of the people close to him and using them as characters in his own songs, not unlike what John Lennon or Ray Davies used to do :

• his daughter, Alabee, as in the title So Begins Our Alabee from the 2005 album The Sunlandic Twins, or Miss Blonde Your Papa Is Failing, a song featured on 2007's Icons, Abstract Thee in which he attempts to explain to his daughter why he and Nina are divorcing.
• his wife Nina, in Heimsdalgate As A Promethean Curse, Oslo In The Summertime but also in numerous songs documenting their relationship, such as "Lysergic Bliss" "Du Og Meg" or "The Past Is A Grotesque Animal"
• Eva, a friend of of Montreal's and resident of their hometown of Athens, Ga, in Bunny Ain't No kind Of Rider.^[6]

Kevin Barnes explained the reasons why he felt compelled to change his writing from personal to fictional and back to personal again in an interview with the music blog You Ain't No Picasso. ^[7], claiming the bad rewiews his first album got prevented him from writing anything from a personal point of view until he got married and his wife gave him the strength to tackle his own issues again. Sometimes construed as pretentious or far-fetched, his lyrics, though mostly concerned with dark themes, often betray a certain fondness for

• French literature, especially the works of Jean Genet, Guillaume Apollinaire or Georges Bataille,
• avant-garde cinema, mentioning Luis Bunuel's Phantom of liberty in Lysergic Bliss, Jaromil Jires's Valerie and her Week of Wonders in St. Exquisite Confessions, or Wong-Kar Wai in Rapture Rapes The Muses,
• Greek mythology – with references to antideluvian Troy in Rapture Rapes The Muses, or his frequent use of antonomasia (Petrach and Dido in So Begins Our Alabee, Cato As A Pun)

On Stage

With of Montreal, Barnes has always tried to cross the bridge between his love of theatre, comedy, and music, often resulting in interludes between songs - skits, slow-motion sword fights and surreal interaction between band members. Since the release of Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?, Barnes has been performing as his on-stage glam rock alter-ego, Georgie Fruit, first mentioned in "Labyrinthian Pomp," a song on their most recent album, Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?. The second half of the album comes after the twelve minute dark epic, "The Past is A Grotesque Animal," a track which stands out in the album and the rest of the of Montreal repertoire because of how it succumbs to dark thoughts of suicide and chemical imbalance, themes hinted at more cheerily elsewhere on the album. Kevin has said that the album shows his transformation to Georgie Fruit, as is evident in the variation in musical style from in album leading up to "The Past is a Grotesque Animal" and the songs after (including "Faberge Falls For Shuggie.") He has described Georgie Fruit as a black man in his forties who has undergone multiple sex changes. Georgie, Kevin told Pitchfork Media, was in a funk-rock band called Arousal back in the seventies. ^[8]

Other projects

• A Pollinaire Rave is a comedy tour by Kevin Barnes, his brother David Barnes and his wife, Nina. A CD with the same name was sold, and five of the seven songs on the EP became songs on the Of Montreal album Satanic Panic in the Attic.
• Kevin Barnes has recently been collaborating with Andrew VanWyngarden from MGMT, on a project called Blikk Fang (formerly Ocelot Fang).[1]
• He also played keyboard on "The Difference In The Shades", and did the background vocals on "A Poetic Retelling Of An Unfortunate Seduction" on Bright Eyes' album Letting Off the Happiness.

References