Where Were You When It Happened?, Joe

Here is my predicament. I came into this week planning to include in my review as many positive descriptors as I could for this week's album by Monotonix. This strategy stems from a discussion I have last weekend that included accusations of my supposedly being "too pessimistic" in my album reviews. I don't have the ability to step back far enough to evaluate whether those allegations are actually true (mostly because I'm also editing and publishing all these reviews and need to maintain that distance occasionally), so for all I know, it's true. And I don't like that. Music is fucking awesome, and to think that I'm here every week continuously shitting on music doesn't make me feel very good at all.

The predicament is that we know turn our focus to Where Were You When It Happened?, which is a great album, but being as it is rock 'n' roll in its most distilled form, it also comes off as extremely nihilistic. I can—and will—sing its praises, but I also get a strong sense that Monotonix would tell me to take my compliments and shove them up my ass. It's weird being optimistic when the album itself is a call for pessimism. If I talk shit on the album, then it's apparently just one more shit-talking blog post in a supposed long line of them. If I praise the album, then I am praising the fact that the world is a wild and dangerous place and that music can be a place for violence. It's a lose-lose.

Count it as further ironic that the person who accused me of being too pessimistic was, obviously, my wife, and without having read her review of this Monotonix album yet, I know for certain that she is going to be extremely pessimistic about her own listening experience this week. Either that, or jump through insane hoops to find something, anything, to like a little bit. I don't begrudge her opinions on the matter for one single second. In fact, it's just the opposite—it would be boring having the exact same tastes as my wife, and I am so appreciative of the fact that we have slightly difference tastes, and thus something to jovially argue about as we drive to yet another first birthday party. (Also, hers is the only feedback I ever get from anyone that isn't "it's too long," so I cherish and appreciate it doubly for that reason.)

But so it was one of those Record Club weeks in which I did not feel comfortable putting on the album of the week as we ate dinner or anything like that, because I knew that Monotonix was "too harsh" for family listening. I'm passionate about my family and I'm passionate about music, and I love when I can combine the two, and I missed out on that this week. Though that probably says more about Monotonix than it does family dynamics in the K*** household (plus, consider the fact that my kids couldn't give less of a fuck about anything of this, because if it was up to them they'd rather just listen to the Moana soundtrack again).

So what does it say about Monotonix? It says that this band is loud and aggressive. It says that they kick ass and are unrelentless. It says that the guitars are harsh and pounding. It says that I probably missed the mark in describing the band as "garage rock" before listening to it. There is more heavy metal in Monotonix's DNA than I would've guessed. I didn't mind it. It's like they were able to go back in time and catch that same proto-metal wave that Led Zeppelin did in their prime. Imagine "Immigrant Song" in stature and "Kashmir" in spirit.

I guess I often talk about "key songs" in reviews such as this, and we can do that here if you want. The key song on Where Were You When It Happened? is "As Noise." It's the skeleton key because it pushes back against any of the aforementioned criticisms that this band's sound is "too harsh" or whatever. The answer: go even further in that direction. The band imagines the criticism that their music "sounds like noise" and then makes that literally true. It's boundary-pushing. There is guitar feedback. There are quasi-religious chants. There is a riff that stomps heavier than anything Jimmy Page ever did. There is a motherfucking drum solo. There is a lot of screaming. It's pretty fantastic stuff.

Look, there's a reason pretty much every picture I have ever seen of Monotonix lead singer Ami Shalev features him shirtless, upside-down, hanging from the rafters—this band is fucking nuts, in the best way. That's why I described them as "rock 'n' roll, distilled to its purest form" above. The sounds you hear on Where Were You When It Happened? are the sounds of rock 'n' roll as it was intended to be. If rock 'n' roll is painful, then it's reflective of life. If rock 'n' roll is cathartic, then it let it elevate your life from the mundane. If rock 'n' roll is a lifestyle, then let us all strip off our shirts and hang from the rafters.

I can't even blame the band for feeling worn out in the album's final song, "Hunt You Down," at the end of this already short album. Monotonix does the heavy lifting in the half hour that precedes that song, and you can tell it took a lot of our them. It takes a lot out of me too. It's the end of Monotonix week now, and I'm tired. But I worn out in the same way I'd feel worn out after a workout at the gym: something was achieved here, and the fatigue proves it. Something was built. Let that something stand as a testament to the work that was done.

So yes, I obviously want to be optimistic about music. And no, not every album that crosses through my earbuds during any given week of RC is going to inspire optimism. It would be boring if they did! Still, it's always nice to come across an album that truly does inspire. Pam is right—hating music every week is no way to live. I don't want to hate music. I don't hate this. I fucking love this. Music lives, thanks to Monotonix.

QUANTITATIVE—GRADE: 4 pukes out of 5

QUALITATIVE—Using an NVivo transcription tool, I have picked out every positive or positive-sounding word in this review, and bolded them. This should give a better sense of the optimism that I felt throughout my listening experience.