Monomania was a 19th century psychiatric diagnosis (that, apparently, is no longer a psychiatric diagnosis) referring to a “single pathological preoccupation in an otherwise sound mind.” “Mono” and “mania” are both Greek words that continue to be used in modern-day English, their combination essentially translating to “single madness” or, as we might more often refer to it today: an “unhealthy obsession.” (“Mono” can then be traded out for the particular brand of “obsession” the patient has, for example, stealing: “klepto-mania,” or fire: “pyro-mania”.)
It’s the “otherwise sound mind” part that makes a monomania so potentially interesting. When a person that suffers from a more “total” mental illness does something that exhibits mental instability, it’s not very surprising, as we already understand that their entire perspective of the world is, in some way, unsound. It also seems rather unlikely that such persons are even able to recognize their own behavior as being anything other than normal. A monomaniac on the other hand, suffers in a special way as not only does their behavior appear to be less easily explained, but they themselves are in a better position to be able to “see” that which they’re obsessed with and recognize that the obsession is unhealthy regardless of their inability to break away from their compulsive fixation.
Deerhunter’s new album is called Monomania and as early as November 2011, lead singer Bradford Cox had seemingly arrived at a self-diagnosis. (“The other guys in Deerhunter, they all found things. And I just have monomania. I always will. I'm obsessive about one thing, that there's one thing that's going to make me happy and it's making music, or there's one thing that's going to make me happy and it's this person.”) Unsurprisingly then, Cox’s obsession with music, and the effect that’s had on him, is a recurring theme of Monomania, the album.
Producer, Nicolas Vernhes, who previously produced Deerhunter’s 2008 album, Microcastle, is back for this album, giving the songs rougher edges than those on 2010’s Halcyon Digest, but with the melodic song-craft that Cox has been honing on his Atlas Sound releases. (And for a salient example of Cox’s musical monomania, see the four Atlas Sound Bedroom Databank albums of solo material he released in 2010.)
Monomania starts with “Neon Junkyard,” a song that sets the tone of the album as a late-night crime drama with an obsessive detective attempting to solve a mystery with no actual answers. References to “neon rust… coloring the blood” seem to point directly to the album cover, which itself wouldn’t be out of place in a film noir. This gives way to “Leather Jacket II,” a song with taunting guitars that strut around in front of Cox’s nigh incomprehensible howling in a manner that practically sounds as if it’s prowling the back alleys of a grimy city looking for clues.
The third song on the album is Lockett Pundt’s obligatory Deerhunter contribution and though it sounds somewhat out of place on this relatively dark affair, it also seems to be starkly relevant to Cox’s troubles. On “The Missing,” Pundt sings: “I would understand, I would understand… show to me the missing” in a way that seems to be an offer of assistance to his friend and band mate; the musical equivalent of saying: “Hey man, what’s wrong?” From here, however, Cox’s obsessions take over for the remainder of the album and while Pundt’s concerns might be appreciated, they’re also probably for naught.
Through the middle of the album, Cox runs rapid fire through a series of extremely well written songs, in various styles, all of which seem to have been created out of the distress resultant of his attempt to balance his musical monomania with a “normal life.” “Pensacola” and “Dream Captain” speak of an irresistible wanderlust, while “Blue Agent” and “T.H.M.” describe the disenchantment with and abandonment of loved ones. “Sleepwalking” and “Back to the Middle” touch on the oblivious passage of time while Cox remains obsessed with trying to perfect his craft. Most poignantly on “Sleepwalking” he sings: “a decade spent searching for something time will never bring/ something starts to shut down inside my body and my tired mind/ too horrified to see…”
“Monomania,” the song, is the climax of the album where Cox seemingly makes one last stand against his obsession before completely falling prey to it. Cox sings “come on God, hear my sick prayer/ if you can, send me angel/ if you can’t send me an angel/ send me something else instead.” It’s a slightly disingenuous plea to God that’s reminiscent of St. Augustine’s famous request: “please God, grant me chastity and continence… but not yet.” The prayer for salvation seems to live side-by-side with the recognition that it’s not very likely.
This inevitability is realized by the end of the song where right after Cox sings “let me be released from this” he descends into a chanting mantra of “mono-monomania,” again and again, compulsively, for the last three minutes of the song. Interestingly, Cox has subtly upped the ante on his monomania. Though making it seems as if he’s only shaping the lyrics to fit the space of the song, he’s also emphasizing the “mono” aspect of “monomania,” so that each time he’s actually singing “mono-mono-mania,” or in other words: “single, single obsession.” Driving the point home over and over: it’s ONE, ONE thing. Again, and again, and again. Cox lets the line ring out repetitively until the music, the object of his obsession, grows so loud and dissonant that it begins drowning out his voice and becomes fused into that which he’s been singing about. It then, oddly, turns into what appears to be a motorcycle, before Cox picks up a guitar and plays the penultimate song on the album.
“Nitebike” is the closet thing to an Atlas Sound song that’s ever appeared on a Deerhunter album. The song is only Cox with guitar and vocals, his loneliness standing in stark contrast to the usual accompaniment of his band, invoking the image of a lone rider on a deserted highway. Cox sings in more intimate terms of his obsessive tendencies noting that he was on the “cusp of a breakthrough” and that he was “no longer in good health” before rather concretely putting his feelings regarding his obsession into words: “I had grown to find/ I had no place in mind/ when I began to drive/ no destination…” Cox’s only “solo song” on the album seems to be something of a reinforcement of his statement that he is somehow “different” from his bandmates because of his monomania with music. There’s a certain alienation that comes with the uncontrollable urge to create and that isolation echoes throughout the solitude of “Nitebike.”
The last song on Monomania is called “Punk (La Vie Antérieure).” “La Vie antérieure” very likely refers to the poem by Charles Baudelaire from his best-known work, Les Fleurs du mal. The French title of the poem roughly translates to “The Former Life” and the poem finds Baudelaire looking back on his life by describing a distinct, palatial sea-side setting in the first two stanzas and then describing himself lounging in luxury, with naked slaves fanning him with palm fronds, while he slowly dies from secret anguish.
Using this as a parenthetical reference, Cox sings: “for a month, I was a punk… for a week, I was weak/ I was humbled on my knees/ prayed to God, make it stop, help me find some relief/ for a year, I was queer/ I had conquered all my fears/ not alone anymore/ but I found it such a bore…” These lines reference Cox previously having sought divine intervention to distract him from his obsession and having come up utterly empty-handed. They also reinforce the idea of his obsession being cyclical and never-ending. The references to time (months, weeks, years) only serving to show that momentary periods of strength only given way to reoccurring periods of weakness.
In the end, it only seems to mean that when it comes to making music, Cox is consistently praying to God to grant him the strength to not let his obsession dominate every other aspect of his life, to the detriment of his love and health and sanity and well being.
God, grant him strength to overcome his musical monomania… but not yet.
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