Listen: Of Montreal's Dark and Freaky New EP 'thecontrollersphere'

Click to listen to of Montreal's new EP, thecontrollersphere

Of Montreal's latest release, thecontrollersphere, comprises songs that were written and recorded during the sessions for last year's False Priest, but this music has an entirely different tone. Unlike that record, which pushed songwriter Kevin Barnes further into funk territory than ever before, these tracks are darker, edgier and noisier. The set is more like an extended psychedelic nightmare, beginning with the loud, violent "Black Lion Massacre" and peaking with the knotty, string-augmented "Holiday Call." The EP will hit stores on April 26th, but you can listen to it in full now.

• 
  MUSIC Exclusive Live Chat With Linkin Park and Incubus
• 
  MOVIES & TV Peter Travers: 'The Avengers' Has it All
• 
  POLITICS Matt Taibbi: Jon Corzine Is the Original Zimmerman
• 
  VIDEOS Exclusive Premiere: Tenacious D's 'Tinnitus'

Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

More Song Stories entries »

Twitter