My #1 album of 2007 was the sixth LP by Athens, Georgia's Of Montreal, led by sole constant Kevin Barnes, who pulled back from big lineups to craft his increasingly complex albums largely by himself beginning with 2004's Satanic Panic in the Attic. These virtually solo albums flaunt complex, multi-tracked arrangements and borrow heavily from ’60s-era psychedelic pop. Hissing Fauna is dense in execution and lyrical content. The quixotic, elaborate style of other recent Of Montreal LPs remains, but the manic bubblegum sound is complemented by prominent servings of modern electro-funk. Much of Hissing Fauna is deeply personal, examining Barnes’s separation from his wife, a self-imposed temporary isolation in Norway, and reliance on antidepressants. I wanted to give you the album's centerpiece, the 12-minute The Past Is a Grotesque Animal, an intense depiction of his marriage's tumultuous breakdown, but it's blocked here. For me, this album is the high-water mark of Barnes's career.
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