Obsession is at the heart of Deerhunter’s sixth full-length album, Monomania. Indeed, it’s the very definition of the word (per Merriam-Webster: “1. mental illness especially when limited in expression to one idea or area of thought; 2: excessive concentration on a single object or idea”). And here, that obsession is focused on American rock music. As frontman Bradford Cox told Buzzfeed earlier this year, “The one thing I aspire to is to be a great American rock ‘n’ roll band … There’s just a lineage, and a history, and a respect for elders.” Monomania is a deliberately American-sounding record with distinctly American references: Dylan, Westerberg, Wilco, Tom Petty, Lou Reed, Sonic Youth, the Ramones, Cheap Trick, Big Star, the New York Dolls, the Stooges … all the way down to other latter-day American bands like Deerhunter, bands that have successfully synthesized countless seminal influences: Pavement, Spoon, Beck, the Strokes, the Dandy Warhols, Ween. It’s also very much a rock and roll album. Cox called it “a nocturnal garage record,” and “a very avant-garde rock & roll record.” He’s not wrong to add modifiers like “nocturnal” and “avant-garde,” but at its core, Monomania could be Deerhunter’s most traditional collection. Perhaps because of that, to some degree, it also sounds most immediately like a classic. –Michael [LISTEN]