The Greatest Album Of All Time: of Montreal's Skeletal Lamping (2008)

[Gabo]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR5tKJJSD9o

I have trouble describing in words how much I love this album. I got it when it was first released in 2008 and it's been on heavy rotation ever since.

I know nostalgia has somewhat corrupted my view but I think, objectively, it may be the best ever recorded. Here are some solid reasons:

1. Easily the catchiest album I've ever heard. Probably the only album that never gives up its melodic steam. Just one amazingly catchy hook after another. No filler here.
2. The lyrics. Absolute insane and amazing. This album might be tied with Dylan's mid-60s albums as the most quotable of all time.

Some of my favorite lines:

"Georgie said romantic love is flat, only for people with no real ambition in their lives." - For Our Elegant Caste

"This life is not a prison, you are always free to go anytime." - Women's Studies Victims

"We function on the lowest human level, yet still somehow keep living." - St. Exquisite's Confessions

"Ladies, I'm screaming out to you from the depths of this phallocentric tyranny." - Id Engager

3. The production is pretty much a combination of everything that's been cool ever. Think psychedelic pop + funky guitar + drum programming
4. It's varied as hell, to universally amazing results. The short piano ballad "Touched Something's Hollow" is as touching than anything on Lennon's Plastic Ono Band IM while the funk anthem "Id Engager" would probably make Prince jealous, if he ever heard it.

Skeletal Lamping might be the greatest display of musical mastery ever laid to disc. I think that's enough to really consider it a worthy contender for the title of "Best Album Of All Time."

Skeletal Lamping is truly a way of life. I'm listening to it now for several-hundredth time.

[the captain]

Of Montreal is probably my favorite band of the past 15 years, but I've got to say Skeletal Lamping ranks about 4th of their past five albums for me, ahead of only Paralytic Stalks. There is a lot to like, especially the triumph of An Eluardian Instance, but I rate others higher.

At work now, but I'm glad to see someone talking OM and will post more substantively and thoughtfully later.

[Gertie J.]

of montreal sux.

[Niko]

of montreal sux.

Good to see that you dropped into the thread for fans who love the band to tell them that.



Haven't heard of these guys, but I will be checking them out tonight.

[the captain]

of montreal sux.

So does misspelling words.

Gabo: I have to be honest, I had totally missed that you were saying you think Skeletal Lamping is the best album of all time. Reading on my phone at work, I thought you were saying it was your favorite Of Montreal album, and I was surprised at that. So now that I've read what you really meant, wow. As I said, for me it's topped by plenty of other recent albums, not to mention several of their earlier ones. I'd say I prefer everything but Paralytic Stalks and the pre-Gay Parade albums to it (not counting the outtakes/rarities/remixes/tour comps). That said, I do like a lot of it.

Woodstock: Of Montreal has a very, very diverse catalog. I strongly recommend you give several different things a try just to get some sense of their breadth. Odds are you'll like something or other. Here are some suggested tracks, starting with the most recent and going backward. It doesn't encompass every sound or album, just some that I like.  can also find all these songs in their studio versions on youtube or Spotify. I bolded the ones I REALLY recommend you try!

The most recent is mid-60s Dylanish; the previous 7 years or so are largely electronic, but not entirely so; before that it is a lot of Zombies/Beatles/Beach Boys/Os mutantes/Kinks influence. Fun stuff.

- 2013, Lousy With Sylvianbriar album: Sirens of Your Toxic Spirit; Hegira Emigre; Fugitive Air.
- 2012, Paralytic Stalks: Dour Percentage.
- 2010, False Priest: Hydra Fancies; Sex Karma; Famine Affair.
- 2008, Skeletal Lamping: For Our Elegant Caste; Touched Something's Hollow; An Eluardian Instance.
- 2007, Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?: Suffer For Fashion; Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse; A Sentence of Sorts in Kongsvinger.
- 2005, The Sunlandic Twins: Requiem for O.M.M.2; Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games [yes, this was an Outback commercial...]; The Repudiated Immortals.
- 2004, Satanic Panic in the Attic: Disconnect the Dots, Lysergic Bliss; My British Tour Diary ... honestly, the whole album.
- 2002, Adhils Arboretum: Jennifer Louise.
- 2001, Coquelicot Asleep in the Poppies: Good Morning, Mr. Edmintin; Peacock Parasols; An Introduction for Isabel; Penelope.
- 1999, The Gay Parade: Old Familiar Way; Jacques Lamure; My Favorite Boxer.
- 1998(?): The Bedside Drama, a Petite Tragedy: One of a Very Few of a Kind; Happy Little Bumblebee.

ENJOY!

[Gabo]

Of Montreal is probably my favorite band of the past 15 years, but I've got to say Skeletal Lamping ranks about 4th of their past five albums for me, ahead of only Paralytic Stalks. There is a lot to like, especially the triumph of An Eluardian Instance, but I rate others higher.

At work now, but I'm glad to see someone talking OM and will post more substantively and thoughtfully later.

I think Skeletal Lamping is the craziest, zaniest album Kevin ever made. It's also his most melodic. I prefer it to Hissing Fauna because of A) the musings of Georgie Fruit are more interesting than his own "I'm so siiiick of sucking the dick of this cruel, cruel city," B) the arrangements are more organic and lack the ugly saw sounds on Hissing Fauna and Sunlandic Twins. I love the constant twists and turns, too. Nothing overstays it's welcome (a la Past Is A Grotesque Animal).

I said "greatest album of all time," because I really think it's an unrecognized masterpiece that's just as good as anything ever released by The Beatles, Dylan, or The Beach Boys.  It's funny that some think that Skeletal Lamping is disappointing. It's really just one great pop track after another, not like The Sunlandic Twins which is roughly half great pop and half filler instrumentals.

I actually turned a friend on to of Montreal when I was listening to Skeletal Lamping in my car. He's basically been constantly playing it since I showed it to him a couple months ago. I tried to show him Hissing Fauna too and it disappointed him.

[the captain]

I think Skeletal Lamping is the craziest, zaniest album Kevin ever made. It's also his most melodic.

I actually think that with the exceptions of maybe False Priest, Lousy With Sylvianbriar, and Adhils Arboretum, it's right on par with the others in terms of the "crazy" and "zany" side of things. Coquelicot, for example, seems to me to have every bit as many bizarre sharp left musical turns, just in a chamber/psych-pop environment instead of a funk environment. But it does add the dimension of the Georgie Fruit character (which actually got tiresome for me, though initially I liked the idea). As for melody, I think that's KB's other constant (along with that ADHD craziness). The musical context changes over time every few albums, the protagonists change (first person confessional, third-person fairy tale characters, first person confessional again, sex-crazed false first-person narrator, etc.), but those two things are more or less KB's calling cards.

Skeletal Lamping wouldn't make my top 25 albums of the '00s, probably, but that said, it's really cool to me that you're into it and promoting it, as I'm a long-time supporter of the group. And Eluardian Instance is, to me, one of their absolute best songs.

(Side note, the bassist [Bob] on the newest album and tour is a [not close] friend of mine [ok, we can call him a friendly acquaintance], and unless I'm absolutely losing my mind, I introduced him to their music about 10 years ago. Bob makes great music in his own right.)

[SMiLE-addict]

It's got the same weird vibe as a lot of Deerhoof. But done in a continuous Abbey Road Medley-style. I can take several minutes of it, but after a while the rapid and sometimes jarring changes get on my nerves.

Some of the little segments might be nice if they were developed into full-length songs.

Entertaining in its own way, but I wouldn't call it an artistic masterpiece.

[Gabo]

I looooove loooove Georgie Fruit so much. I honestly find the more personal writing on Paralytic Stalks and Lousy With Slyvianbriar pretty boring compared to stuff like "Plastis Wafer" and "Wicked Wisdom." I like the change in accompaniment on Lousy With Sylvianbriar, it fits the wordplay a lot more than the kitchen sink approach of Paralytic Stalks, which I consider easily one of his worst LPs (Bedside Drama, Cherry Peel, and Sunlandic Twins are the other three).

I don't necessarily say "all" the music he's made is consistently melodic. Most of Cherry Peel and Bedside Drama have very bland melodies with cumbersome chord changes. He became a much better craftsman on The Gay Parade. Also, half of The Sunlandic Twins is filler instrumentals and ugly sounding  trash like "Death Of A Shade of Hue." I don't understand why a bonus CD comes along with the album when the main program itself is so flawed. He should have put those songs on the album, and threw out the experimental stuff.

[Gabo]

It's got the same weird vibe as a lot of Deerhoof. But done in a continuous Abbey Road Medley-style. I can take several minutes of it, but after a while the rapid and sometimes jarring changes get on my nerves.

Some of the little segments might be nice if they were developed into full-length songs.

Entertaining in its own way, but I wouldn't call it an artistic masterpiece.

IMO everything fits together perfectly. When I first got it I was like WTF but after a few listens the changes felt much more natural. I think it's a perfectly constructed record.

[the captain]

I don't necessarily say "all" the music he's made is consistently melodic. Most of Cherry Peel and Bedside Drama have very bland melodies with cumbersome chord changes. He became a much better craftsman on The Gay Parade. Also, half of The Sunlandic Twins is filler instrumentals and ugly sounding  trash like "Death Of A Shade of Hue." I don't understand why a bonus CD comes along with the album when the main program itself is so flawed. He should have put those songs on the album, and threw out the experimental stuff.

I agree that he's improved, I'd just say melody has never been a major flaw. As for Sunlandic, I totally disagree. I think it's wonderful, only slightly worse than its bookends of Satanic Panic and Hissing Fauna, both of which I think are among the best 20 albums of the '00s.

[Gabo]

i can't warm up to stuff like October Is Eternal and Death Of A Shade Of Hue. It just sounds like obvious filler material to me.