Titus Andronicus
The Monitor
XL; 2010
My first introduction to the music of this earnest rock outfit was during a day show at Red Eyed Fly on the Saturday of SXSW 2009. I was impressed by how much energy the guys were able to muster up in the middle of the afternoon on the fourth straight day of playing shows all over Austin, TX. More importantly, I was rather astonished to see so many people rush to the floor and start jostling with each other during the band’s 40-minute set, as day shows at SXSW are notoriously filled with industry people just standing around drinking and talking. After hearing Titus Andronicus play through a sizeable portion of The Airing of Grievances, I plainly stated that I was eager to hear where and how things could progress from there.
With The Monitor, we hear a band eager to both stretch its wings and continue to grow into its influences. The album itself amounts to a coming-of-age take and glorious tribute to the state and culture of New Jersey under the guise of a concept record about the American Civil War battle between Monitor and Merrimack. Sonically, Titus Andronicus splits time between old-school Jersey punk energy, the weary country-punk of The Gaslight Anthem, the histrionic indie-folk of Bright Eyes, and the inimitable storytelling penchant of Bruce Springsteen.
Heaps of adjectives quickly enter my brain while working through this ten-song effort, with brawling, brawny, boozy, brazen, weighty, and wordy serving as a decent sampling. Thematically, a strong “Us vs. Them” mentality prevails – the refrain of, “The enemy is everywhere!” is repeated frequently and returns at key junctures in the story’s timeline. But instead of injecting that section with fresh life, the appearance of these recurring slogans proves to be quite boring and annoying, causing me to mumble to myself, “Not this again!”
Much like Bright Eyes is wont to do (see “Let’s Not Shit Ourselves (To Love and Be Loved)” off Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground), the band rants and rages often and interminably against injustices, whether real or imagined. I can respect any artist who finds a workable, cathartic outlet for his/her anger and passions, but I have a hard time understanding why eight of the ten tracks on this record are five minutes or longer (a full five of ten run at least seven minutes!). Yes, I get that you want to weave a fine tale about your pains, hurts, and struggles, as you intelligently wax poetic and nostalgic about the keggers, parties, friends, lovers, and other pleasant memories from your past, but I can only take so much bellowing and bellyaching before I tell you to buck up and move on with your life.
For all of my own wailing and complaining about how tracks like “Richard II,” “To Old Friends And New,” and “The Battle Of Hampton Roads” tax my emotional patience, I found myself occasionally enamored with the heft and breadth of hyper-literate vision employed by Titus Andronicus. “A More Perfect Union,” “A Pot In Which To Piss,” and “Theme from ‘Cheers’” speak well of the band’s capacity to wrangle and corral the heaps of ponderous, tortured verbiage into some rousing choruses, vamps, and outros.
Do I feel that The Monitor is a bit too bloated stylistically and overwrought emotionally, which caused it to sag, wobble, and teeter under the burden of its own ambition? Sure I do, but I don’t want to sling too many arrows at any band willing to put all of its ideas out on the table and then chase each one down with unabashed abandon. So, next time, dear Titus Andronicus, I’d like to see if you could employ a bit of editorial discretion, while not scrimping on the energy and enthusiasm.