When I recently chatted with Titus Andronicus, they told me they hate playing large venues. I'm sure the main stage of an amphitheater approaches the high end of venue size, but it didn't seem to phase Titus. They still brought it, and the half-filled crowd returned the massive amount of energy, even at three-o'-clock in the afternoon.
If there's an easy way to sum up Titus' music--especially if you haven't listened to their defining album The Monitor--it's this: their logical approach to playing a 45-minute set is to make the penultimate song a 15-minute epic about the Civil War. Titus burned through "The Battle of Hampton Roads" in all its fifteen minutes of war-hero-decorated glory, in 90 degree heat. Patrick Stickles' veins burst from his neck, and Amy Klein's headbanging contrasted with her infectious smile, as the crowd seemed to be filled with Jersey natives (or sympathizers).
With little-to-no breaks between songs, it seemed that Titus wanted to give the crowd the fullest show they could in their short set time. I've seen Titus sets span up to two-and-a-half hours, exhausting their entire catalog and delving into a repertoire of covers. But the opportunity for moshing in a set of just a few tunes from The Monitor was way more than enough.
