Cue up song six on "Congratulations," the second album from Brooklyn alt-rock duo MGMT, and you’ll get an immediate read on whether you’ll take a liking to the rest of the record. The song is “Siberian Breaks,” a 12-minute extravaganza with at least five distinct musical sections that range from stately folk to psychedelic space ballad to a New Age synthesizer breakdown that’s half Jan Hammer/half Yanni.

If you can keep your mind open long enough, through the infuriating parts, through the parts that sound like a deranged progressive-rock cover band making up a song as they go, I guarantee you’ll find moments of sudden beauty and musical bliss that will carry you through the rough patches just fine.

And so it goes with the rest of "Congratulations." MGMT, consisting of Andrew VanWyngarden and Ben Goldwasser, have made it very clear that they mean this album to be devoured as a whole, going so far as to refuse to release any singles from it. That’s quite a change from their debut, "Oracular Spectacular," which gained the band fame thanks to two indefatigable singles, “Time To Pretend” and “Kids.”

Those singles, as memorable as they were, sounded like they could have been the work of two different bands. Well, neither one of those bands is evident on "Congratulations."

Ironically, considering the funkiness of songs like “Kids” and “Electric Feel” from the first album, the sound that MGMT creates here is decidedly rhythm-averse. Save for a brief disco strut that busts out at the end of the otherwise hazy reverie “Someone’s Missing,” this is music to which you can groove, but not really dance.

The influences here are mainly psychedelic, which means that a band labeled by much of the music media as being forerunners of a new sound, have actually reached deep into the past for inspiration. Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd is prevalent on the chugging, fuzzed-out opener, “It’s Working.” The instrumental “Lady Dada’s Nightmare” finds its antecedent in some of the experimental efforts of ELO. And “Flash Delirium,” the first “taster” used to promote the album, throws some of those influences into a blender, zapping through New Wave, prog, and the glam-rock stomp of vintage T-Rex.

What makes this stuff go down easier is that the duo manages to deflate any threat of indulgence with touches that are just downright fun. “I Found A Whistle” marries a pretty melody and acoustic guitars to some mystical/mythological poetry pilfered from Robert Plant’s diary circa 1972. Meanwhile “Brian Eno” sounds like what Tenacious D might have come up with had they chosen to honor the erstwhile producer, as MGMT grants him omnipotence in this maniacally catchy track.

I can’t really argue, after hearing the results, with the band’s plea to their audience to not cherry-pick from this album. The crazed sound collages would make little sense in bite-sized pieces; heard all at once, the shape-shifting starts to become a theme in itself, and the whole thing coheres in counterintuitive fashion.

The final homage is perhaps the most unexpected of all, as the boys borrow the descending bassline of album-closing ballad “Congratulations” from “The Weight” by The Band, who were averse to all things psychedelic. Still they make it work, as VanWyngarden sings ironic lines about basking in his rock-star fame while all else is crumbling, a nod back to the ambivalence that marked “Time To Pretend.”

In truth, MGMT need not feel guilty about any accolades that come their way for this marvelously inventive head-trip of a record.

SAMPLE "CONGRATULATIONS"

Adobe Flash Required for flash player."Flash Delirium"

Adobe Flash Required for flash player."Brian Eno"

Adobe Flash Required for flash player."Congratulations"