Of mOntreal Defends Their Honor

Of mOntreal frOntman Kevin Barnes finally got around to reading Pitchfork's review of their new album False Priest yesterday. He was, to put it mildly, not amused. He calls the reviewer a dickhead, an asshole, a cusshole, as well as flaccid, puritanical, and sex-hating. At the end, he questions the reviewer's credibility because he didn't mention every single song on the album, then lazily compares Pitchfork to Fox News, including a picture of Bristol Palin at the end of his post.

But this isn't the first time Rob Mitchum, the guy who wrote the review in question, has written about one Of mOntreal's albums. He also reviewed 2007's Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer? You can only imagine what score Mr. Mitchum, who Barnes describes as, "clearly not insightful or intelligent, at least not in terms of his understanding of music production," gave Hissing Fauna.

That's right. An 8.7. In the review, he described the album as "ceaselessly fascinating and inexhaustibly replayable." 

I knew that Kevin Barnes had an appreciation for irony, but I had no idea he'd take it to this level.

A note to artists. I can't think of a single example of an artist who publicly complained about a review and came out looking better as a result. It only makes you look childish, and makes you seem like you take yourself too seriously (which, if you're going to spend your time berating negative reviews, you probably do). And in this case, you have someone who's in one of the most successful indie bands in the country berating a writer for Pitchfork who most people haven't heard of, calling him names, etc. based on a review that went to great lengths, for the most part, to give the band a pass on this album--a sort of, well they'll probably do better next time. It seems to me like Rob Mitchum was being generous. Here's an example of Of mOntreal's latest work of unassailable genius.

Throughout his blog post, Barnes switches off between playing the victim as well as the bully, depending on which role best suits his purposes at the time. But no matter which persona he adopts, he consistently comes across as a petulant asshole.

Hopefully, no one will show him this review from The Washington Post a couple of months ago. Now that's a bad review. And unlike Rob Mitchum's, an exceptionally well-written bad review.

Or this kid. Keep scanning the comments section on his youtube. Who knows when Kevin will strike again.