Sometimes, an album just hits you at the exact right time in your life. The Monitor was one of those albums.
It was early Spring of 2010. I was driving around in a shitty Toyota Camry, 1991 edition, commuting back and forth between my parents' house and La Salle on those few days a week I actually had class. I was single, and sleeping on couches on the weekends, because it was pretty evident at that point that no women were inviting me into their beds. Life was weird. It felt weird because at that point in my life, La Salle's campus was my home, and I didn't live there. I was just squatting. I was constantly on the precipice of expulsion—at least, that's what my nemeses in Community Development wanted me to think. Inebriation was pretty standard. I mean, shit, I wasn't like drunk driving or anything, but my Four Lokos were usually three quarters empty, and for the first time in my life, it made me more sad than ecstatic. The Spring of 2010, man, fucking weird.
Anyways, enter The Monitor. I had always listened to Titus Andronicus. I was never a fanatic, I never took a trip up to New York to see them or anything, but "Fear and Loathing in Mahwah, NJ" was my fucking jam, and their second album seemed like it could be a stunner. It was.
The Monitor is a concept album. Loosely, of course—concept albums always are. But it had a theme. On its surface, it was about the Civil War. There are short interludes throughout of poems from that era, and songs allude to battles that happened during the war.
Really, though, the Civil War is used as a metaphor. The civil war, whereas in real life was North vs. South, brother vs. brother, is instead, in this allegory, an existential crisis of the self. Our hero (me, you) feels like his hometown can no longer contain him. The enemy is everywhere, and escape is imperative. The world is ripe to be explored, and though it would be painful to leave that hometown, he has to know what's out there.
There I was, in the Spring of 2010, and I too was driving through my hometown every day, wondering what the fuck it was all for. I had friends, I was getting a decent education, but it all felt so frivolous. Don't call it a meltdown; I survived, I made the best. But it was, all in all, a rough time in my life.
Patrick Stickles understood that. "Waking up, it's rarely worth it, / The same dark dread every morning... You will always be a loser." He was singing what I was feeling. And fuck, he was singing it with such abandon. What he was singing about was a malaise, a depression. But he turned them into anthems.
A whole hour goes by of this. Anthem after anthem of how shitty you feel, but at the same time making you feel that you could possibly be on top of the world or at least punch a hole through the roof of your Camry.
The album ends with "The Battle of Hampton Roads." Our hero (me, you) returns to his hometown, having discovered OUT THERE that where he needs to be is RIGHT HERE. The civil war wracking his brain is over. He discovers that he already has everything he needs. He'll always be a loser, but he will make the best of it.
Not everything is perfect. It never will be. Just listen to the final, triumphant guitar riffs. The solo stretches for minutes, and it soars over every fucking mountaintop. The entire album is leading up to this point, the whole band is barreling towards the big fucking finale, we reach the climax... and the guitar goofs up. There's one note in there that is not supposed to be there. It's just one note, but it's more of a squawk of the amplifier than anything. Thirteen minutes of "The Battle of Hampton Roads" ends in a fuck-up.
I've probably been close to tears every time I hear that discordant note. It's beautiful in its imperfection. It lets you know that the work is never done. You'll always be a loser. You make the best of it, but that's WORK, and you gotta give it your best every day, even when you fuck up. And kids like us, we're gonna fuck up a lot.
I don't know if The Monitor means as much today as it did back then. I still consider it my favorite album of all time, but as the years go by, and I settle down into a comfortable and happy life (e.g., marriage, home ownership, and uh maybe kids soon sheesh!), The Monitor becomes more and more a relic of a time once had. It's still a stunner of a rock album, and I can count among the songs some of the best rock and roll songs of our lifetime, and that will never change, I don't think. But it might not kick me in the gut forever. We'll see.
So here we are, on the eve of The Most Lamentable Tragedy, the ostensibly true follow-up to The Monitor (Local Business was lean and mean, and fucking incredible, but in a way that's very different than my favorite sprawling epic). I don't want to set my expectations too high. It's getting great reviews but I am using cautious optimism.
Because the thing is, my life isn't really a Tragedy. And I know there'll be value in the album—I'll always be miserable sometimes, and I'll always be able to relate to this miserable, uplifting music. But the way that The Monitor hit me in my 21st year, I dunno if an album will be able to rock me emotionally ever again.
Goddamn though, I'd love to see Titus Andronicus try.
See y'all at 5 AM tomorrow morning.
