By Gregory Hedquist
Of Montreal began their 2026 US tour right at home in Athens, Georgia on the evening of June 19th this year, supporting their newest album aethermead.
Before the main act, opener CorMae came up and immediately their playfulness shined through. As vocalist Amber Appleton joked to the crowd, each of the band members took turns smiling sporadically and randomly as if there was an enthusiastic and willing contagion between them. This pattern continued between songs, and during their actual performance the energy CorMae kept bottled was unleashed and shined in their abrasive and loud garage punk sound. As the musicians maintained their focus and rock-n-roll swagger, Appleton sang and yelled blunt lyrics regarding topics from current politics to mental health. On top of it, they moved and danced very erratically to the music while smiling. These antics culminated in a crowd surf (with the singer making it a point to obtain consent) as the sea of people carried them from the stage to the back and right to the stage again, all while Appleton sang and the musicians kept right on with them. CorMae’s upbeat and silly punk rock presentation ended in a consistently fun conclusion with Appleton donning a colorful monster hat and the bassist donning a giant cat mask. CorMae, in just a short time, left a serious impression on the Athens crowd and left them appropriately loose and amped for the oncoming main act.
Shortly before Of Montreal took the stage, several crew members erected a platform of the cyclops creature on the aethermead cover before projecting the album’s cover art onto it and the wall behind it. As we waited, the projections slowly dissolved between the cover art, psychedelic imagery, and sunsets all while the cyclops blinked periodically. Though these projections were very pleasing to look at and were more than sufficient to keep the excited audience pacified, it did not take long for Of Montreal to ascend to the stage afterwards and open with energetic fan favorite “Id Engager.”
To the Athens crowd, Of Montreal needed no introduction and they knew it. Once they got started, they barely stopped to fraternize with the audience as any concert-goer would come to expect. Like a musical freight train, they seamlessly and passionately powered through classics like “Bunny Ain’t No Kind of Rider” and “Sleeping in the Beetle Bug” to songs hot off their newest release like “Wanting on Air” and “Already Dreaming.” To complement their music, Of Montreal made sure to spice up the stage with several appropriate and unique additions appropriate to each song. The aforementioned platforms returned a couple of times with projections like hand drawn, colorful scaly fish and royally dressed monkeys with giant exposed brains. Projections like fractals, flowers and shimmering landscapes of color continued to adorn the wall behind the performers as well. By far the most striking part of the performances apart from the musicians were the costumed dancers. The dancers wore bodysuits of all different colors and were dressed in very striking ways; from white ghillie suits with Hulk hands, to an orange bodysuit with red and yellow hair, a lei and a stylized Guy Fawkes mask. The dancers certainly did not lack variety in appearance as they danced erratically together.
All of this put together made for a supremely entertaining show from Of Montreal, but of course as they said their goodbyes the crowd demanded an encore. The band kept the crowd waiting for a few minutes before the 40 Watt went totally dark. In the darkness the musicians ascended the stage one by one with only a dim projection of pulsing bobcat outlines illuminating the stage. As they began playing their instruments one by one, the puzzle pieces to a delightful, building musical tension became clearer and clearer. When Of Montreal’s home crowd recognized the building “The Past is a Grotesque Animal,” they went totally feral as they screamed and yelled without abandon in overwhelming pleasure and excitement. As frontman Kevin Barnes took the stage once more, the song continued to build for minutes upon minutes. Of Montreal expertly got the entire crowd vibrating in their shoes, priming them for the explosive ending to their encore. Every band member leapt and danced with the crowd, and I vividly remember one musician almost knocking his stack of synthesizers over in the chaos. After their totally electrifying encore concluded, I remember one person in the audience totally exasperated and awestruck remarking to a friend about how they did not expect their favorite song to be played, let alone that it be played in such a way.
Of Montreal’s almost 30 year long presence in the consciousness of Athens, Georgia really shined through as they perfectly worked the crowd (almost entirely wordlessly) the whole show. I think I can confidently speak for all of Athens when I say we eagerly await their return!
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