How can you go wrong with an album whose cover features a man holding a sign that says "Will play to food"?

Marshmallow Coasting, the latest offering from the beautifully demented musical mind of Andy Gonzales, features the rest of Of Montreal as his backing band. The addition of this permanent musical backbone allows Gonzales to finally bring his skewed pop vision to proper life.

While Marshmallow Coast's previous albums were both fine efforts, they lacked cohesive musical flow, sounding more like a collection of unrelated songs than an album proper. That has changed with Marshmallow Coasting. Its 16-song cycle is as complete a pop album as you could want, full of lilting melodies, delicate instrumentation and Andy’s twisted lyrical view of American life. Gonzales and his Of Montreal cohorts paint a series of miniature rural mosaics, employing elements of country, bluegrass, bubble-gum pop and new-wave to color their canvas. Songs like "Siddartha" and "There Will Come a Time" exude a laid-back country charm, while "Bizarre Classical V" and "Bizarre Classical VI" add touches of Victorian elegance and Vaudevillian weirdness to the proceedings. Other songs, like "Oblong Destiny" and "Lil’ Fun Machine," are fun-filled romps through a sun-drenched musical wilderness.

Marshmallow Coasting proves itself to be a solid (if eccentric) pop record, and one which showcases the ever-improving songwriting of Andy Gonzales. If nothing else, it should be enough to keep E6 fanatics going until the new Elf Power and Of Montreal albums are released.