Of Montreal
the bird who ate the rabbit's flower EP
Kindercore Records
Of Montreal is not afraid to admit its debt to '60s pop: the liner notes to this e.p. name-check both The Beatles and The Beach Boys. Despite the overt influences, there's nothing nostalgic and little derivative about this band. This is some of the freshest music around.

Of Montreal blends musical genres with considerable liberty, capitalizing on the high points of Lennon/Wilson songwriting: rich vocal harmonies and the raw, rhythmic, guitar-based sound that untethered teenage dolls from Manchester to Malibu. Writing great songs of love, loss, confusion, betrayal and flaming fuselages, the Athens trio shows up decades of half-baked jam rock in four songs flat. Their catchy cover of The Who's "Disguises" reveals debts not only to the innovations of Pete Townsend, but latter-day technicians J Mascis and Thurston Moore as well.

The opening track here, "You are an Airplane," recalls the early Talking Heads of '77 and More Songs About Buildings and Food, with fear of a crashing jet a metaphor for a troubled friend. Proving that quality songwriting is welcome at any time in any form, Of Montreal's "The Inner Light" and "If I Faltered Slightly Twice" are just as powerful today as "Dont Worry About the Government" or "Psycho Killer" were for the Talking Heads in the last days of punk in '70s Manhattan.

Take David Byrne's advice: "It has nothing to do with your personality or style/ Be a little more selfish/ It might do you some good." Go buy yourself this record. (P.O. Box 461, Athens, GA 30603.)
Christopher Wyrick