SXSW Records

Titus Andronicus

The Monitor is a near perfect union of cacophony and immature angst. It's impudent and insolent and a little smarter than it needs to be. It's like a punk rock record but with enough actual musical competency to carry the songs out. That sounds trivial until you see that, much like 2008's Festivus-inspired debut The Airing of Grievances, going seven-minutes plus on the clock is pretty routine for Titus Andronicus, and for the hell of it, the band goes for a full-on Yes-scale 14-minute opus in "The Battle of Hampton Roads" with its literal mixing of the sacred and profane ("There's a way to live the values your forefathers gave you/Prepare to be told 'That shit's gay, dude.'") It's like a Greetings From Go-Fuck-Yourself Park, N.J. Thank god there are still some parents responsible enough not to medicate their kids so they think everything is going to be just peachy. (Thu., 11pm, Beauty Bar/Palm Door; Sat., 10:15pm, Red 7 Patio.)