Of Montreal

If Of Montreal's lead singer and songwriter, Kevin Barnes, claimed -- in his best Barbara Mandrell-like drawl, of course -- that he was indie dance when indie dance wasn't cool, he'd be well within his rights. Barnes has been working with a jumbled mix of '60s psychedelia and '80s electro for the better part of Montreal's last three or four releases, and few can match his elaborately infectious dismounts -- even during moments of constipated pretension like "The Past Is a Grotesque Animal," in which the Georges Bataille reference is dead weight and the thin, raking synth line goes on and on at a lecture's length. That minor misstep aside, it's hard to fault Barnes's impeccable sensibilities when it comes to shoplifting grooves from acts such as the Beatles, CAN and Prince. Across Fauna, Barnes plays audio chemist, fusing layers of himself harmonizing with himself onto rhythms as difficult to set up as Milton Bradley's Mouse Trap. And to its monumental credit, overall the album sounds like it was conceived with a genuine sense of wholeness.