Earlier this year Of Montreal’s front-man Kevin Barnes regaled a Las Vegas audience with a stark-naked performance. In a subsequent interview he said such antics would be restricted to 21-and-older shows, so a nude repeat in Crawdaddy was always going to be unlikely.
But regale us he did, even with his clothes on.
Of Montreal appeared as part of the Nokia Trends Lab Experiments and despite the fact that the Crawdaddy stage was much too small to contain their theatrics, the Georgia band put on a spectacular performance.
Kevin Barnes was resplendent in a crimson and white jumpsuit, but the best-dressed crown was snatched from him by the feathered and winged bass player.
The packed-to-claustrophobic-proportions crowd lapped up fantastic renditions of ‘Bunny Ain’t No Kind Of Rider’ and ‘Heimdalsgate Like A Promethean Curse’, both from recent album Hissing Fauna, You Are The Destroyer. Barnes appeared almost shy when addressing the crowd, in complete contradiction to his outrageous physical appearance.
Throughout the set, the band were subject to constant interruptions from a black-leotarded man sporting a silver-coloured mask, a suited corporate drone reading a newspaper and a bizarre lobster-shaped glove. The visuals were stunning; from candy-coloured cartoons on loop to distorted images of the live set spinning dizzily behind the band as they played.
At times it was difficult to keep track of the on-stage carnival, and after a while some fans didn’t bother craning their necks for a better view, they just closed their eyes and listened. The sound quality was less than perfect, but Barnes superseded all technical difficulties. His hardly rock-and-roll statement that his mum loved Ireland was met with cheers instead of cynical heckles, a ringing endorsement from the besotted audience.