Pop fans rejoice: Here's yet another delightful concept album from a member of the Elephant Six family, Of Montreal, who actually hail from Athens, Georgia. Of Montreal are more like third cousins to

Gay Parade

Pop fans rejoice: Here's yet another delightful concept album from a member of the Elephant Six family, Of Montreal, who actually hail from Athens, Georgia. Of Montreal are more like third cousins to the E6 clan; their sound is cohesively pop oriented and distinctively quaint. The songs are bouncy, keyboard- and vocal-driven gems that collapse barbershop harmonies and well-enunciated, Tin Pan Alley vocalizations with Anglo mid-'60s pop (especially that of the ever-popular Kinks). The lyrics on Of Montreal's third full-length weave an intricate story in childrens-book logic, with invisible trees, a miniature philosopher, and a cast of hundreds. The words from the buoyant "Fun Loving Nun" (whose chorus appears to have been sung by the mice from Babe) can be seen as The Gay Parade's moral: "Some of us get covered up by the world, become bitter from our loneliness and forget our dreams." --Mike McGonigal

Gay Parade