Monster (Steppenwolf Album)

Monster (Steppenwolf Album)

Monster is an album by Steppenwolf. Released in 1969, it was their first LP with new lead guitarist, Larry Byrom instead of Michael Monarch. The album was Steppenwolf's most political one, making references to important issues at the time, such as the Vietnam War.

The title refers to the contemporary politics and state of the US, as in the lyrics to the title song:

"The cities have turned into jungles,

and corruption is stranglin' the land.

The police force is watching the people,

and the people just can't understand.

We don't know how to mind our own business,

'cause the whole world's got to be just like us.

Now we are fighting a war over there.

No matter who's the winner, we can't pay the cost.

'Cause there's a monster on the loose,

it's got our heads into the noose.

And it just sits there... watching."

The album was the first Steppenwolf album not to feature a US top ten hit, and can thus be seen as the beginning of their slow fall from fame. Even though this album, "Live", "Steppenwolf 7" and "For Ladies Only" are today seen as making up the latter half of their ultimate prime, their days of "Born to Be Wild"-like fame were over. Still two singles from the album cracked the top 40, and Steppenwolf would continue landing albums in the US top 20 for a while yet, a factor that became more and more important during this time.

Be that as it may, the song Monster, its lyrics have become more and more meaningful as time progressed, reflecting the hidden agenda of oligarchies even into the 21st century. To say that the lyrics are stuck in the 1960's and reflect only the Vietnam war is to harbor a myopic view of the true nature of things global, with feudalism, fiefdoms, eugenicism, now mutating into transhumanist movements becoming ever stronger and more evident on the part of these oligarchies. Those in power in the 1960's are still in control as the lyrics say:

"The spirit was freedom and justice

And it's keepers seem 'friendly' and kind

It's leaders were supposed to serve the country

But now they were paying no mind."

The Vietnam war was a means to an end, speculated to have even been planned well in advance of its occurrence. This next lyric further describes the atmosphere that the 21st century exudes:

"You know they talk about law about order

But it's all just an echo of what they've been told."

And this succeeding lyric instills the awareness that what Kay, Edmonton, St. Nicholas, Byrom wrote in the 1960's is still valid in the 21st century as it was in the 20th and the previous centuries mentioned in the song:

"And though the past has it's share of injustice

Kind was the spirit in many a way

But it's protectors and friends have been sleeping

Now it's a monster and will not obey."

"'Cause there's a monster on the loose

It's got our heads into a noose

And it just sits there watching"

Of all their songs, albeit "Born To Be Wild" was a battle cry for the social engineers responsible for directing the world into a planned and present state. Monster has the most depth in reality and belies its namesake, Hesse's Der Steppenwolf; the lone wolf on the plains, the common clave who are not part of the social few who are moving behind the scenes to bring about their vision of evolution. This lyric emphasizes the increased and ongoing state of affairs:

"And corruption is stranglin' the land

The police force is watching the people

And the people just can't understand."

Little has changed since Plymouth Rock to have this lyric written in the 1960's. In the 1620's that "rock" was a relic, a symbol that all human power and greatness was in the soul of man:

"Chasing the promise of freedom and hope

Came to this country to build a new vision

Far from the reaches of kingdom and pope."

Hence the chorus, "America, where are you now, don't you care about your sons and daughters, don't you know we need you now we can't fight alone against the monster."

The new "rock," Monster, deserves to be put on its own pedestal for keeping the fires of freedom lit. Even if it failed to achieve music industry fame and fortune, it achieved much more than a trendy social norm and a set of mores and becomes the torch carried further from just merely being "born to be wild".