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How does the electric pop punk Of Montreal live up to past antics of arriving on stage on horseback? Arrive on stage flanked by gold stormtroopers of course. The sci-fi opening is not the last we see of costumed capers either. Fans at London's Koko are witness to smartly dressed pigs, cockerels and manic silver masked men. Just your average night in the presence of Of Montreal then.
Nine albums in, and the six-piece show no signs of letting up. Rampaging through most of new release ‘Skeletal Lamping’ was the order of the day, overlooking earlier classics, but delivering still the same. Id Engager kicked the show off with a tiger and cockatoo fighting bang, and the energy never slipped below dangerous.
Flamboyant frontman Georgie Fruit, aka Kevin Barnes (think Ziggy Stardust, aka David Bowie), bounced his way through an hour and a half set with very little audience interaction. Not that there was time for talking. The unrelenting pace danced from track to track quicker than you can say Ussain Bolt. When speaking was needed, it was left to guitarist Bryan Poole, although ramblings about wanking off to the image of his sister were wholly disturbing.
The stage is their theatre and the crowd their glitter minions, hurling themselves around to ‘Heimdalsgate like a Promethean Curse’ from 2007’s ‘Hissing Fauna, Are you the Destroyer?’ LP.
Freud would have a field day with the cartoon backdrops of pulsating tigers, rainbow palettes and comic book montages, all the while with Georgie Fruit singing “I wanna know what it feels to be inside you.” The therapy sessions would be endless.
The Sonic Youth/Scissor Sisters irreverence comes to a primal head during the encore. ‘Gronlandic Edit’ gets the crowd bouncing like its 1999, and the closing song couldn’t be predicted. “We are going to do something a little different now” Fruit declares. That they did. Ending on Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ is about as cocky as they come. Good job they back it up then.
