This week New Jersey maximalist punk band Titus Andronicus releases its third record. It’s called Local Business, and it’s very good. I’d like to go into specifics regarding the how and the why of this record’s goodness, but there’s a problem, and I guess you could call it an appreciation gap. Titus Andronicus is one of those bands that a small but significant group of people know and love intensely, and a much larger group don't know at all. There really is no in-between here. To know Titus Andronicus is to love them. To not know Titus Andronicus is to feel hostility over yet another “cool” rock band being foisted upon you by roving gangs of emaciated, patchily bearded hipster devils.

I don’t want to inspire violent, knee-jerk reactions in Titus Andronicus neophytes, nor do I want to appear pedantic to those who already care about this band. So I’m going to address both groups separately. If you’re already a Titus Andronicus fan, please skip ahead to the bolded words "NOW FOR THE REST OF YOU." I’d like to first address the neophytes:

The Headliner

Puss in Boots

It might be tough to get excited about a spinoff of the Shrek franchise, but at least in the case of Puss in Boots, Antonio Banderas — voicing the titular kitty — sounds like he's having a ball (of yarn) (I had to, guys). And at least this tertiary Shrek character has a little charm; we very well could have gotten a Gingerbread Man movie, and for all the money we've given DreamWorks for Shreks over the years, we would have deserved it.