Last week Kevin Barnes watched the final edit of Song Dynasties – a new rockumentary documenting the life and times of his band Of Montreal.

“It shows how Of Montreal is always changing, getting new people, burning bridges and making enemies along the way,” says Barnes, who founded the ever-changing line-up in 1996, taking its name from an ex-girlfriend’s hometown.

“We are always moving forward and enjoying the excitement of the creative process.”

For the band’s 12th album, Lousy With Sylvianbriar, Barnes shook up the line-up once more, recruiting a whole new band for the recording sessions and ensuing tour.

He admits the album originated as a side project, only taking the Of Montreal name once completed.

“With the last record, Paralytic Stalks, which nobody really listened to, I was influenced by 20th-century avant-garde classical music,” he says. “I was trying to create this sprawling musical landscape. There were a lot of songs over six minutes long, which avoided any sort of commercial aspect. I didn’t want to make anything too easy or accessible.

“I got really far out and with this record I wanted to make something that sounded more intimate, that could be presented in a simple way with an acoustic guitar and voice.”

Indeed, when Barnes speaks to The Guide, he is about to play exactly that format for a show in the university town of Berkeley, just outside San Francisco – the city which provided much of the inspiration for his new album.

“I had listened to a lot of records that were written and recorded out here, and were really influential,” says Barnes, citing the likes of San Franciscans The Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane as well as touchstones Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan and Neil Young.

“There was a counter-culture scene that arose here in the 1960s which was really inspiring to me.

“San Francisco is very culturally diverse, which makes it exciting and a bit dangerous. As far as popular culture goes it’s probably as important, if not more important, than New York City, in my mind.”

The album was recorded in Barnes’ hometown of Athens, Georgia. As it was intended as a side project, he decided to assemble a group of musicians he had not worked with before.

“I probably would have been self-conscious if I had felt from the beginning this was the end of the old thing,” he says. “It all happened organically – I was able to trick my mind into going in this new direction. At the end, I decided to call it Of Montreal and had to break the news to the people who used to be in the band that they weren’t going to be in the band any more.”

He describes the new band as having a higher level of musicianship than his previous players.

“I’ve got nothing against the old band members,” he says. “In the past they were playing the parts I asked them to and getting into the theatrical side, but it wasn’t as well conceived as this group is.

“They are ten times the musician I am – they understand music on a level I don’t, being a self-taught musician. It’s exciting to play with people who are so much better than me. They add elements I wouldn’t be able to think of myself. We can have extended jams, and I can give abstract direction and they just go with it.”

Fans of the band’s madcap live shows – as documented in the forthcoming film – will be glad to hear that, in Barnes’ words, “we haven’t left the circus behind”.

Intense creative energy

But there is definitely an intense creative energy, with Barnes admitting he is already halfway through a follow-up album, which he hopes to get in motion by taking his new bandmates to a cabin in North Carolina in September.

One of the most notable elements of the new album – aside from catchy, instant classic songs such as opener Fugitive Air and the politically edged Belle Glade Missionaries and Amphibian Days – is the beautiful voice of Rebecca Cash, whose vocals perfectly match and lift Barnes on tracks including Colossus and Sirens Of Your Toxic Spirit.

“We have a lot in common,” says Barnes. “We understand each other on a deeper emotional level. She’s really good at mimicking vocal styles. If I say it’s going to be sung with attitude, she’s really good at being able to replicate that. I was used to self- harmonising so it’s cool to have a voice that blends.”

Outside of the band Barnes says he is working with another woman close to his heart – his nine-year-old daughter Alabee.

“She’s definitely a musical person – she writes songs all the time,” he laughs.

“Now she’s learning piano, she’s written about 15 songs. It’s cool to see but I don’t push her in any way.

“I’m not pushing records on her or forcing her to practise, it has to be something you’re naturally interested in. We have recorded songs together and she’s getting really into it, although she only ever wants to do one vocal take and move on.”

Support from Calvin Love.