12" EP on orange vinyl including download code, limited to 1,300 for the world. With Home Alone on Halloween, noted rock band Titus Andronicus [hereafter +@] celebrate the spookiest of the seasons by staring into the abyss and confronting the bone-chilling terror which lies at the haunted heart of our human experience. Bearing the justly feared catalog number MRG666, the 12-inch EP spans 31 minutes and features three tracks recorded concurrently with the group's most recent full-length A Productive Cough, offering an autumnal tableau of dread and decay to complement its LP companion's springtime visions of rebirth and new possibilities. The title track remixes A Productive Cough's hardest-rocking selection, foregrounding its ominous strings and swelling organ and featuring a soulful new lead vocal from frequent +@ special-teams captain Matt "Money" Miller, while "Only a Hobo" plucks an oft-forgotten gem from the dusty corners of the Bob Dylan songbook to paint a grim portrait of hopes dashed and potential squandered. Eeriest of all is "A Letter Home," which, across nearly 17 minutes and more than 1,200 words, drags the listener along for a harrowing descent into the darkness and proves definitively that this ceremony is no mere monster mash. "Death is not scary," explains +@ singer-songwriter Patrick Stickles, shaking off a cold sweat. "Everyone has to die, but not everyone gets to die surrounded by love with the satisfaction of a life well-lived. What frightens me, far more than ghouls or goblins, is knowing that I may yet face the former without the comfort of the latter. When it comes to that of which nightmares are made, a werewolf popping out of the bushes is nothing next to a life without love when it is too late to turn back."
