Titus Andronicus is not a band that minces words. They found a mission statement long ago, with their 2008 debut The Airing of Grievances, and have been concisely expounding upon it ever since.
Airing of Grievances showed what would become touchstones for the band’s sound: starting with an excerpt from Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus and ending with a passage from Camus’s The Stranger, the boys showed themselves to be brash, hyperliterate kids in the throes of an existential crisis.
These themes were refined in 2010’s career-making opus The Monitor. Using the American Civil War as a conceptual framework, the album chronicles the challenge and vacuity of the millennial quarter life crisis. Encompassing lost love, self-determination, and Bruce Springsteen, the album is punctuated with passages from the writings of Civil War leaders like President Lincoln and Jefferson Davis.
The juxtaposition and recontextualization of towering American legends bridges to their newest release, Local Business, which falls far closer to flag-waving than flag-burning on the patriotism scale. With their hearts set on stadium rock but the weight of the modern man on their shoulders, the guys paint an accurate picture of what the Average Young American feels and experiences. They describe a sort of self-conscious Pro-Americanism; skeptical of the commercialization of the establishment, while fiercely loyal to the classical ideals of freedom and equality.
To limit Titus to a solely cerebral experience would be doing them a huge disservice. While the lyrics morph with changes in perspective, the musicality is immediately visceral. The shout-along choruses are layered over guitar-charged rock reminiscent of a slightly less adventurous The Clash. The live show follows suit, Patrick Stickles’s piercing whine cutting through the bullshit to deliver some uncut truth. When they were in Madison last November, I had the pleasure of seeing them live and I can’t wait to pay to see them again. First of all: it was $12 tickets. Unreal. Second of all: $12 shirts. I don’t even understand how that’s economically viable, but I appreciated it nonetheless. Third of all: the crowd. There was a giant mosh pit that was dedicated but respectful of bystanders. I spilled whiskey on myself twice. It was everything you could expect. I can’t emphasize enough that this is a show not to be missed.