Shows during the week are gonna kill me, but what can I do? On Thursday night, I was trying to stay awake, fighting for not falling asleep on the spot while waiting for Titus Andronicus to come on stage at the Center For the Arts in Eagle Rock, but when they finally came, I sure got the wake up call! The energy these four guys deploy on stage is that of an army, soon another fight was going on, and I must admit that the battle was ferocious. With rhythms to beat out your head on the stage – many guys in the front row pretty much did this during the whole show – a great sense of melodies underneath epic and grandiose structures of triumphant rock guitars à la Springsteen, Titus Andronicus delivered a great punk show, while frontman Patrick Stickles was removing a layer of clothes every half hour.
It was a royal battle, a giant fight that didn’t want to end, and even though I had seen ‘curfew at 11 pm’ on a sign posted inside the building (the Center For the Arts is located inside a residential area), they played way past that time, making one with the crowd, with was following each of their moves. There was nevertheless a spectacular moment in the middle of ‘To Old Friends and New’, as Stickles stopped and looked at a guy making a big fuss of his crowd surfing, ‘That’s what you wanted?’ Stickles asked him,… a silence followed, ‘Now it’s on me again!’ he said before continuing the song. Stickles is great as a punk rock hero, dark haired and bearded, skinny like the Christ after several days on the cross, and furiously passionate at what he is doing,… a more intense vision I have rarely seen.
I had seen the band a few years ago, during the 2010 FYF fest, but this new line-up was making things a bit different, no Amy Klein on violin, no keyboard, a leaner line-up just consisting of guys with guitars, bass and drums, often singing in the front together, making the term frontman a bit obsolete, despite Stickles’ strong presence. He wasn’t even facing the crowd, his mic was turned toward the left and, as I progressively moved to the left side of the stage because of the rowdy crowd, I was then facing him. At the beginning, I was a bit lost and not recognizing any songs they were playing (‘In a Big City, ‘Upon viewing Oregon’s Landscape with the flood of Detritus’, ‘Still Life with hot Deuce on Silver Platter’) as I hadn’t spent much time listening to their 2012 release ‘Local Business’, well, shame on me! But these songs sounded more straightforward rock’ n’ roll and far less epic than I remember? May be I was still a little asleep… Then he brought us ‘way back… to the trauma of birth, with ‘My Time Outside the Womb’, a song from their 2008 ‘The Airing of Grievances’, and I was back on track. The setlist was going back and forth from their debut album (that I like a lot) to their critically acclaimed ‘The Monitor’, to ‘Local Business’ and songs, such as ‘Look Alive’ (a strangely short song compared to their usually odyssey-long songs), ‘Stranded’, ‘Fatal Flaw’, ‘C’mon’,… which seemed to be new, and will probably feature on their upcoming 30-song-rock-opera-double-album (according to Iman) set to be released next year.
The ambiance always becomes steamy in this Center for the Arts place, but it was more than ever the case, heavy sweat was dropping from Stickles’ face every time he was leaning down, and every arm and elbow that was bumping in my face or ribs was wet and sticky… I decided to move on the edge of the stage, a few songs before they played the epic ‘Albert Camus’, one of my favorites of all times, for obvious reasons. The tone of the night was alternating between light moment like this brief cover of Frankie Lymon’s ‘Why Do Fools Fall In Love’ between two songs – to celebrate the recent engagement of a friend – to deep advice for all these kids, like, removing our mask and be ourselves, ‘The alternative is a lonely life’, said Patrick Stickles with a strong commanding voice, ‘and who wants this? Not me!’
There were a few more favorites (‘No Future Part Three’, ‘Titus Andronicus’) received by the crowd with fists in the air, foreheads banging against the stage, and sing-your-head-off sing-alongs. All these last songs sounded like a combat fought till the end, even when the fight has been lost a long time ago,… at this point Patrick Stickles was showing his naked torso, erupting off stage a few more times and looking more than ever like the hero of his Monitor’s songs. The room smelt like sweat, it felt like 100ºF, and everyone was slowly leaving the room with their ears and heads still resonating from the distortion left after the last song, ‘Four Score and Seven’… ‘This is a war we can’t win/After 10,000 years, it’s still us against them’ they had all sung together a minute ago, as if they were a bunch of drunken buddies fighting against the same enemy. And that’s what they all wanted.
