Of Montreal's Kevin Barnes goes way real on Aureate Gloom. Telling secrets. Talking some hard talk in Bassem Sabry about "a master's voice," and how he's never followed it. There's chatter about how this record is a true record of some tough times in Barnes's life--and no doubt, you can hear it--but he's not navel-gazing here, or at least he doesn't indulge that impulse entirely. Barnes seems like he's mourning not only his own personal relationship-failures and nadirs and bummers and fuck-ups, but also ours, all of ours, our horrible bullshit tendencies to destroy and consume and hate and burn and kill everything, why not. Thinking hard about the inherent shittiness of human beings is bound to produce some downer tunes, though Barnes does well to keep things steady, hummable, and wild.[BUY Aureate Gloom]