of Montreal in Saint Louis

A great interview (though they really had to mention the "O" word) + live footage found on Vimeo today. It was shot on October 24th when the Ninjas Prove It circus came into Saint Louis, Mo. And for once, it's been edited into something enjoyable, comprehensive and coherent.

Enjoy!

of Montreal at The Pageant from John Elder on Vimeo.

Aloha

Rounding up our Honolulu special, here are three more interviews/articles...

Jamey shares his thoughts on the new tour and his solo project.

Jamey on stage in Gainesville, Florida - 2008-12-05

The Honolulu Advertiser tried to interview some homegrown of Montreal fans this week, but apparently didn't find any ("we overestimated of Montreal's Honolulu following because if there is one, we didn't encounter it.") and came up with a pretty weird idea and penned a quick primer to of Montreal instead. Oh well. They followed up their article with a review of Skeletal Lamping, which is somewhat bizarre as the album was released 6 months ago.

We will keep you posted on the new setlist for the tour but so far the only thing we heard through the grapevine is that a new song is being premiered.

EDIT : not a new song, actually, but "Tender Fax" - a song by of Montreal's side-project, Instant Witch, which is "a democratic of Montreal," with everyone involved in the songwriting process. A live recording of the song (live at Rothbury 2008 is available on our downloads page)

Full setlist of the Feb 19th Pomona show (thanks to AceAzzamen at the Townhall) :
We Were Born The Mutants Again With Leafling
Bunny Ain't No Kind Of Rider
And I've Seen A Bloody Shadow
Gronlandic Edit
Sink The Seine
Cato As A Pun
Tender Fax
Beware Our Nubile Miscreants
An Eluardian Instance
She's A Rejector
Heimsdalgate Like A Promethean Curse
October Is Eternal
Mingusings
Id Engager

Encores :
Requiem For OMM2
American Girl (Tom Petty)
The Party's Crashing Us
A Sentence Of Sorts In Kongsvinger
The Repudiated Immortals

Wolf Pack Radio, Honolulu Weekly interviews...

After a lengthy (by oM standards, two weeks and a half!) pause between tours, of Montreal hits the road again today. Check out our tour dates section and grab the remaining tickets!

Not much news to report, but three more interviews (re)surfaced...

First one is kind of old news, as it was recorded for 1700 AM Wolf Pack Radio (who knew that even existed, uh?) back in December, but it's always great to hear Ahmed, so check it out.

Second interview, thanks to Honolulu Weekly is pretty weird - as it's got to be the shortest article ever written. They make it sound like the interview lasted less than 5 minutes, but there are still a couple of interesting Beeps factoids in it.

Third one comes from of Montreal's nemesis, Brooklyn Vegan. It's not an interview, but they do mention the Happy Happy Birthday To Me split 7" that the Booty Patrol kind of forgot to mention before... Only, they refer to Jamey's side project as James Hubbard, which is both hilarious and, er, pathetic.
But it still comes as a really handy reminder - now is the chance to subscribe to HHBTM's singles club, if you haven't already done it. Subscribing for the whole singles club series is your only chance to get the record - and a bunch of other vinyls from great Athens, Ga. artists such as the Apples in Stereo, Circulatory System or the twee-noise-garage outfit Cars Can Be Blue. Well worth the money if you ask me.

Kevin denies the existence of Blikk Fang demos.

If you've been one of the numerous fans eager to figure out what Kevin and Andrew VanWyngarden's side project might sound like, you probably tried to search for Blikk Fang online... Well, the couple of songs that you downloaded are not Blikk Fang songs, apparently. In an interview with BBC 6's host Nemone, Kevin claimed that these were actually songs Andrew recorded years ago, and one old of Montreal b-side.

If you happen to have a recording (or transcript) of the full interview, which was apparently broadcast on January 19th, please contact us. The Booty Patrol would love to add it to its database.

Merchandising

As we are still holding our breaths for the spring Skeletal Lamping collection (if it is still in the works...), the Polyvinyl store has recently restocked a lot of items, and apparently got a hold of the unsold tour-only shirts, scarves, undies and whatnot.
On a similar note, you can find high quality, exclusive Gemini Tactics prints in her etsy shop.

Click on the pictures, take a look and prepare to go bankrupt.

Podcasts

Technically, this is nothing new, but I don't think these have been reported before...


Bryan's interview with Electric Boogaloo - some podcaster out of Toronto - hear what Beeps has to say about Skeletal Lamping, the live shows, laser shows and more stuff I haven't been paying enough attention to, apparently...

Another BP interview unearthed! This time from Philadelphia's Used Wigs website. It is actually a very enjoyable podcast, but if you want to go straight to the (beeps) point, it's 24 minutes in... Here, BP talks about what it's like to live in Athens, offers some insight about the A Pollinaire Rave comedy tour, and discusses why Philadelphia's is one of his favorite cities (and a whole lot more!).

Watch of Montreal's Utrecht performance!

I have to admit, I'm starting to think that the Dutch are godlike creatures sent from above... Not only did Fabchannel stream the Paradiso performance, 3voor12 now posted the full video of the Utrecht set, warts'n'all! (and a lot more warts than usual...)

Unfortunately the Booty Patrol hasn't been able to find a way to embed this, so click here, sit back and enjoy!

New Year's Eve videos!

Many thanks to Townhaller Fredrick, who filmed 6 songs from of Montreal's New Year's Eve set (almost in their entirety!) and just made them available to the masses.

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And for those of you who were not paying attention a while back, the whole set (2 oddities, 14 covers, 6 of Montreal songs) is downloadable from You Ain't No Picasso. Happiness in mp3 format. Thanks to Matt @ You Ain't No Picasso for hosting the files, and isawyouonyourbike for the recordings.

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RTBF Pure FM podcast

Belgium's LGBT radio show Bang Bang interviewed Kevin some time before the Botanique show on January 22nd. The podcast (dubbed in French) is downloadable from their website but folks at the Townhall get antsy when the Booty Patrol speaks French, or champions French (or whatever), so I transcribed what I managed to hear in English.

Q : I don't know if you're aware of the fact that tonight in Brussels there is the gay & lesbian film festival... Is it a coincidence?
K : Well, maybe not... God works in mysterious ways...

Q: Are you often shocked by questions?
K : No, never. I've no idea what it would take to shock me... Something physical would have to happen.

Q: So I won't hurt you...
K : Unless you start to choke me, I think I'll be fine.

Q: I know it's a phony question, but do you feel like a gay icon?
K: That would be weird because I'm not gay. But I really champion the gay cause, because I feel like so many people are so uptight and feel like they have to identify with their gender. They think they have to have a fixed identity, it is so important to them. Being caught making out with a person of the same sex would be a nightmare for a lot of people, which is absurd. I think people should be free to explore and less uptight.

Q: Do you think that what we call in French “la fluidité des genres” is an important thing and do you think that there will be a time when people are more comfortable with gender fluidity?
K: It's hard to say. Humanity has always been like that. We carry this burden and we pass it on to our children, who will in turn pass it on to their children... It clearly doesn't seem to be getting any better. But maybe, eventually, yeah... maybe it'll be a whole new epoch and everyone will be free... I don't know... At the same time, as long as people are not violent and don't fight you for being who you are, and don't hinder your self expression, I don't care if someone's uptight. Really, they have their own reality and it's their thing... I have my own reality and it's my thing. I'd be as much of a fascist if I tried to turn them into someone like me and threaten them with punishment... Obviously the first step is for everyone to be cool and care about their own business. I wouldn't want everyone to be like me. I'll do my thing, you'll do your thing and as long as we can live together peacefully, that's fine to me.

Q: Do you hide behind a character or can someone listening to your songs guess who you truly are?
K: You can definitely get to know me personally. Nothing's ever purely fictional. Everything I sing about is something that occurred to me, that comes from my mind... I can't fake it. I couldn't write something that's completely alien to who I truly am, how I truly feel... At least on some level, there is honesty in everything I do.

Q: So who's Tim?
K: Tim was a very good friend of mine when I was growing up in a small town. There wasn't any cool people around, people like us... Tim is the only person I had – I wasn't sexually attracted to him, but to me, it would have been perfect if it had been the case. We had great moments together, and I was really fond of him... It's kind of a tragedy of sexual preference.

Q: Would it have been a problem for you to be sexually attracted to a man?
K: No, not at all. I look forward to it. I love it when something unexpected happens, something I'd never thought about, things I'd never thought I'd do. I try to stay open to new experiences, and not have any strict rules for myself : “this is who you are – this is how you should act.” I want my identity to be as fluid as possible, and I really like it when I find myself obsessed with something I never thought I'd even like. That's the exciting part of life. Something new comes up and it adds value to your life.
So if I ever feel some kind of chemistry with a guy, I wouldn't hesitate and I'd go for it. But that's still kind of tricky, because I'm married and I'm in love my wife, so we'd have to have a threesome or something.

Q:?
K: When I was growing up, I was always making up stories and daydreaming and acting out scenarios. We did theatrical stuff with my brother and my cousins and we would put on shows at family gatherings. Then I really got into sports. I was very butch back then, and somehow as a teenager I grew more feminine again, because I realized that my sports friends were very uptight, not very open-minded, and you had to be very tough and very stiff all the time and I just wasn't like that.
But that's funny, because I still really like sports. I like the idea of being this kind of fruity guy who's still very athletic and good at sports, and maybe even better than the other straight guys...
Q: But with purple nail varnish...
K: Exactly, I'd do like a jumpshot with sparkly nails and freak their minds.

Documents Sonores Recherchés

Une fois n'est pas coutume, je blogge en Français... of Montreal est, comme annoncé ici à la recherche d'enregistrements audios de qualité décente des derniers concerts européens... Si vous avez enregistré quelque chose, ou si vous connaissez quelqu'un qui possède des enregistrements, merci de nous contacter.

Allez, j'en profite pour poster quelques liens francophones...
Les Inrocks.
Une chronique du concert du Bataclan avec de superbes photos en prime.

The Interface session

We are a bit late posting this but it is still worthy of inclusion. I think this was recorded last year on November 22nd when of Montreal was in Los Angeles but I wouldn't bet on it... Anyway, do check out of Montreal's Spinner session (3 acoustic performances and an interview) and don't forget to check the video links (bottom of this page, on the left) for the 2007 session. And then maybe comment on the session you like better? Oh, yeah... sounds like a good exercise in nerd writing.




Photo by Collin Erie for Spinner.com.

Drowned In Sound interview

Here is part two of the seemingly never-ending Kevin interview...
This time John Brainlove asked him about :

--> politics ("I feel like we need watchdogs that are gonna make corporations protect their employees and regulate products so we don't get products that hurt people.")

--> of Montreal's live shows, and the drummer vs. backing track debate.

--> The Skeletal Lamping collection, the reviews the record got.

--> his new musical direction ("But what I wanna do now is really create something a bit more esoteric, that's the direction I'm going in, that's what I'm excited about. More textural, more atmospheric, still with lyrics, for me at least it's good to have lyrics, that's interesting, and then musically what has developed so far is like a controlled chaos, things rising up for a moment and taking your attention then being overtaken by something else...")

The Guardian Weekly Music Podcast

You've got to admit the British media know what they're doing.
I don't know if it's got something to do with the fact that it's easier to conduct interviews when interviewer and interviewee speak the same language, or if it's because Britain is warming up to of Montreal, but Kevin & Co. were there for a week or so and it now seems to be an endless stream of interviews and videos recorded there.

The venerable Guardian interviewed Kevin.

And the NME had the great idea to give our favorite troubadours a camcorder and let them run with it on the day of their Franz Ferdinand support performance. Thanks to my favorite Belgian, Arnaud, aka Townhaller Crazy Horse, for the head-up.
Watch the results below...

of Montreal will play Bonnaroo 2009

The rumors have been confirmed - of Montreal will play in Manchester, Tn. The Bonnaroo festival will run from June 11th to June 14th, and the lineup is simply amazing.

Check out what they have to say about of Montreal.

In case you haven't been paying attention to the Tour Dates section (which are kind of updated on a daily basis these days), the band will also play the Norman Music Festival. The good news is that it's free.

Kevin on balconytv.com & ITN

Right before the show at the Button Factory in Dublin, Kevin stopped by to perform "An Eluardian Instance" by himself... Check it out.





Also, more from ITN - hear what Kevin has to say about An Eluardian Instance. Now isn't that perfect timing?