# The Check-In with Kevin Barnes-of Montreal Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262/the-check-in-with-kevin-barnes-of-montreal Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262/the-check-in-with-kevin-barnes-of-montreal.md Podcast: [Tour Stories/The Check-In with Joe Plummer](https://stenobird.com/podcast/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262) Published: 2026-05-15T07:00:00+00:00 Episode link: https://www.ruinousmedia.com/tourstories Audio file: https://episodes.captivate.fm/episode/559669dc-168f-42b6-84f5-a30c103d5da7.mp3 Processing state: not_requested JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262/episodes/the-check-in-with-kevin-barnes-of-montreal Duration seconds: 1781 ## Resource Kevin Barnes is the singer, multi-instrumentalist, and songwriter for of Montreal. aethermead, of Montreal’s 20th studio album is due out June 5th via Polyvinyl Record Co. Kevin shares the unusual heartbreak story behind the new record, why it felt right to go with a more collaborative approach and how the invented record title relates to a very important part of his daily routine. He tells us how limited time shaped the record and brought more life than expected into the songs. The two discuss Kevin’s lyrical approach, how it can be a complicated version of projection and why that may inform the listener’s experience. Kevin tells us how he wound up teaching a course called “Songwriting Crimes and Recording Atrocities” at Bennington College, why making a music video with his daughter was a special experience and we sample a couple new tunes for aethermead. of Montreal Polyvinyl Record Co. Tour Stories would like to welcome our newest sponsor Kuma Coffee. Kuma Coffee is a 100% Independently owned roasting company right here in Seattle since 2008. Kuma is a 5-person team, roasting over 100,000lbs of exclusively high scoring coffee each year. They source their coffees direct from origin and pay well over fair trade pricing to farmers. This guarantees the highest quality, while supporting rural farming communities throughout the Global South They also just launched an instant coffee… (Joe’s favorite instant) Find everything Kuma at Kumacoffee.com Episode supported by our friends Izotope This episode is produced with Ozone 12, the newest from Izotope. Head over to izotope.com now for savings on all their production software. Go check out Ozone 12 and RX 12 and master with the best and solve the unsolvable 20 plug-ins for mastering mastery. Use code FRET10 at checkout. Ep su… ## Actions - request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262/episodes/the-check-in-with-kevin-barnes-of-montreal/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode. - read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/tour-stories-the-check-in-with-joe-plummer-3168262/the-check-in-with-kevin-barnes-of-montreal.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource. A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed. ## Transcript Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.