Phantom Shadow

I have to start by admitting my bias as a long time fan of Machinae Supremacy fan. Well over a decade ago I head their remixes of popular Commodore 64 and Amiga games and was hooked! That being said their newest, Phantom Shadow, may be their highlight as a group. This concept album is not the most instantly accessible that Machinae Supremacy has put out but after a few listens through you will enjoy the production and intricate amount of sounds woven together to make each track work.For those that are not too familiar with Machinae Supremacy, way before 'chip tune music' was popular and really even 'retro', Machinae had perfected the art of combining sounds from 'retro' systems like the Commodore 64 into 'real' rock/metal music. While the SID/Chip tunes at the beginning of the track "Perfect Dark" may come out of left field a bit, in the track "The Bigger They are the Harder They Fall" Machinae provide a perfect example of their ability to use SID/CHIP. The electronic parts mix and blend in so seamlessly once the track starts that you forget that SID and metal were never intended to be used together.Tracks like Europa show a totally different side of Machinae, a slower paced more acoustic side with guest female vocalist, something I wouldn't mind hearing more of. Immediately after that it flows into the heavy and more familiar track like Throne of Games. Several short tracks provide transition between sections as the story unfolds.Favorite Tracks:Europa (totally different but great!!!)Throne of Games (probably the most hardcore metal track)Beyond Good and Evil (maybe the most accessible track on first listen)The Bigger They Are the Harder They Fall (Best use of SID/Chiptunes)Renegades (maybe the second most accessible track on first time listen)Hubnester Rising (epic ending to the story/beginning to the new story to come?).If you are a Machinae Supremacy fan you can't go wrong here. New listeners to Machinae may have to 'adjust' the unique vocal style of the lead vocalist before they truly enjoy the tracks, fortunately he has improved greatly throughout the years as has the group. From a production and technical standpoint, this is their best effort to date, over 60 minutes of Machinae and not one track is a 'failure' in my opinion!

I've been listening to these guys since my friends introduced me to them in highschool, back when the band was putting their songs out as free digital downloads on their website. I've been listening to them ever since and they are hands down my favorite band. There's a wide variety of music I enjoy, but MaSu is by far and away my favorite. However, while I am a gamer, it's not just that it's video game-influenced that I enjoy their music, but that it is so refreshingly energetic, empowering, and unique-sounding in an age where mainstream music reflects a society (at least here in the US) that has become incredibly narcissistic yet also incredibly dull and complacent. Whiny music about guys who are never sorry enough for their women, who are also moping, who are always forlorn, who are always ready to put everybody but themselves first, and are always perfectly happy with being exactly the same and never making an effort to change. And don't even get me started on what the females listen to these days....But that's not what MaSu is. Machinae Supremacy can be summarized in one phrase: Empowerment by being badass. And that is something that has been embodied in all of their albums, and all of their songs. Many of their songs reflect that unique element of videogames in that the player is usually empowered to save the day, which their music captures very well. Needless to say I find that this energy is rather infectious and even addictive. Their music has always been consistent in that regard, even as they have gone down the gradient curve towards being more mainstream in some of their albums over the years (not that I'm complaining as some of their best music came from their most "mainstream" album I feel).I was rather excited to learn that a new album would be released this year. When some samples of their new album hit Youtube, I became even more excited. This was to be a concept album, and from the sounds of things, would hearken back to their older work, with a greater focus on their bit-tune style of fusing chip tunes with powerful chords and even more evocative and to-the-point lyrics.When the album came out a few days early on Youtube I listened immediately to the entire thing. Hands down, this is by far and away their best work. It's has the rawness and power of their older work, but the refinement, maturity, and experience that their later work has. This is definitely the best of both worlds, as you have many callbacks to their prior albums and songs, yet despite some of these similarities the album clearly carves out its own distinct identity among its predecessors.Probably my only issue with the album is that it is a concept album, and I found it somewhat difficult to follow what is exactly happening and why, and to who and when. Not that it really bothers me that much, though while its clear to understand what is happening, the specifics are hard to lock in on. Are these events all happening at the same time and we are seeing them from different people's perspectives? Or are we seeing things in a set chronological order? However, this does provoke some repeated listens to suss out what's happening. However on their own at an individual level you can separate these songs from the album as the whole and they are not lessened for it. The songs mostly stand on their own merits sans the overarching storyline.The only other potential con to the album is that the lead singer, Robert Stjarnstrom, is Swedish, and English is clearly not his first language, though he does seem to speak it well enough. It's not that he speaks broken English but that he tends to have high-pitched or nasally vocals. Personally this never bothered me when I originally heard them, though I'm sure this could be a sticking point for some people. I don't really mind. Their music is as such that it is not HOW it is sung that makes me enjoy them, but WHAT they are singing.That being said, the entire album is excellent. You have several songs that seem to be callbacks to older songs or even continuations of older songs in the case of Renegades, which was probably one of the most amazing and surprising moments during my listening to the album. You have them treading some new ground as is the case with their acoustic Europa (though even this has some callbacks to their older song Flagcarrier). You also have them once again playing some infectious, devil-may-care tunes with The Second One, which is probably my favorite song in the entire album just because it is completely NOT what you would ever hear on the radio or mainstream music today as it seems to be sung from the point of view from a reformed villain/mercenary who has agreed to stand for the good guys and will turn his bloodlust towards more productive pursuits, like slaughtering their enemies mercilessly. Yet, tonally, the song is very upbeat and chipper, but powerful nonetheless and catchy as hell. You just don't hear a whole lot like this with music these days in general.However, some of the most powerful and serious chords are saved for towards the end of the album, especially with The Bigger They Are and Versus. The Bigger They Are goes back to their older instrumental stuff where they let their music do all the talking, building upon some very heavy and powerful chords backing up some very awesome lyrics as it builds towards the climax of the album. Versus is very evocative of songs like Masquerade or Soundtrack to the Rebellion, though with apocalyptic lyrics and mythical themes. Some VERY excellent riffs and solos and the lyrics themselves are evocative as they are catchy.I think that's what is different with this album for me. I find myself SINGING along with the songs very often. There's something about the subject matter and the lyrics that makes it very tantalizing to sing along. I would usually just listen to their other work, but rarely sing to it.Unlike their last few albums, their SID Metal roots are very prominent here. Lots of Chiptunes in their songs, though they accentuate and complement the songs nicely.There's just not a lot like these guys out there. I know we have bands like Dragonforce, but MaSu doesn't feel like it's fantasy but has always, just like in real life, embraced technology and the future and not fled from it like a lot of music does today. In many cases their music paints a dystopian future landscape but only so that their music presents to us a hero and empowers both them and the listener to rock the boat and take control of our lives, and carve our own better future rather than wait to have others do it for us, because just like in their dystopias, nobody will. Their music both celebrates gaming but also celebrates the listener, encouraging, just like in their games, to become the hero in their own lives and, as is said in Nemesis and Renegades:"BE POWERFUL,STAND FAST AND PROUD!"

Likely the best album by Machinae Supremacy to date!