One of those songs that give me nothing. Dull musically and irrelevant thematically – Mr M. is a great guitar builder and MK likes his guitars, and so what? There really was nothing else to put on the album instead? Or just make the album shorter! I just don't get MK's decisions sometimes.
Edit: Added "decisions".
But you can say that about many songs, MK songs included. He's got a song about a quality shoe, a song about stew from the same album, not every song is going to be a story about two English astronomers and American history bundled in a 5-minutes song or a take on Shakespeare himself. The Beatles wrote a lot of pointless or simple stuff, but it's still interesting because everybody can find something in it.
I think the trouble with Monteleone is that you need to do some homework beforehand and know who John Monteleone is, why Mark wrote this song and how it was born, why somebody would make a guitar like this, it's a lot to ask from an average listener. But then again, you don't need to know anything about the Mason–Dixon line to enjoy Sailing To Philadelphia. So I don't know, really.
Mark doesn't know whether a song will be forgotten or will resonate with people. I don't think that Monteleone is the song that was buried under a huge weight of the rest of his songs, I think it's pretty important, especially since Mark, just like John, is such a craftsman himself, the only difference is John crafts instruments from wood, and Mark crafts his songs from words. It's an amazing take on his own work, I think.
I understand what you're saying, but Mark deals with a similar topic in Kill To Get Crimson, which I think is a much more interesting song.
As for researching to know the context of a song, that's normal, and not only for Mark's songs.
Didn't I read, many years ago that Mark had said that Bob Dylan had taught people that songs didn't have to just be love songs?
Mark writes stories to music, & surely that's why we like them.
I blame Mr Bob 
Exactly, I remember seeing Bob Dylan's "Like A Rolling Stone" topping every single list of the best songs ever written and always thought that it was strange cause it's definitely not a musical masterpiece for sure. But it had an impact on the music industry that can't be topped, that's why it's number one. And he probably received a Nobel prize for a reason, too.
With Monteleone, it's quite clear to me that Mark didn't care about how this song will be received and wanted to make a beautiful present for a great guitar builder. He even invited him into his studio to show the song or something, that's certainly a way to show some affection. He even recorded a real string orchestra which is a rare thing for MK and a very expensive endeavor.
And now since this song is all over the new John Monteleone documentary 13 years later, I think it did really well.
