Kevin Barnes’ prolificacy is his biggest enemy. Between LPs and EPs, the of Montreal mastermind has issued eight projects in the past nine years—a staggering rate when you consider his Homeric prose and wild sonic shifts. To be a Barnes fan is to be perpetually exhausted—just when you’ve digested a pivot toward psychedelic electronica (2016’s Innocence Reaches ), he’s already moved on to demented glam-rock (2017’s Rune Husk ). You have to respect his commitment to Bowielike skin-shedding, but sometimes you wish he’d relax and edit himself. (The most efficient way to absorb of Montreal’s past decade is to compile the highlights into one encyclopedic double-LP mixtape.) But Barnes thrives on annual chaos, so now we have White Is Relic/Irrealis Mood : another elliptical title marking another mini-evolution. Strap on those headphones and prepare to sweat. Here, he moves away from the organic band vibe of his recent work into warped laptop dance-pop, largely crafted on his own. But, like every Barnes project since his kaleidoscopic 2007 triumph Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer? , this one thrives or dies based on a simple maxim: When he condenses his heady poetry into easily digestible bunches (the atmospheric synth-funk of “Writing the Circles/ Orgone Tropics,” highlighted by a smooth-jazz sax break), he’s back on his A-game; when he can’t (the awkward rapped triplets of “If You Talk to Symbol/Hostility Voyeur”), he isn’t. You emerge from Barnes’ orbit with the usual conclusion: There’s a compelling album floating around in there somewhere.