Resuscitating, ascending
Augmenting reality
Which is why I’ve never felt so
Alive
Riding the waves of her acclaimed album Arcana (2022), American progressive darkwave artist, producer, and multi-instrumentalist C Z A R I N A steps boldly forward with her third LP, Empire, released under the French-German gothic label darkTunes Music Group. Now rooted in the rugged coastlines of Galicia, Spain, she continues her evolution, creating a piece as ambitious as it is expansive.
Empire stretches into the cosmos yet dives deep within, tracing themes as vast as transhumanism, mysticism, rebirth, and the mysteries of spacetime. These are worlds and ideas that C Z A R I N A shapes with both earthly and celestial forces in mind, drawing upon sacred geometry, quantum mechanics, and the cycles of life and death. Her sound is layered, a fusion of orchestral swells and gothic choral elements interwoven with electronic synth currents. Each track pulses with introspective lyrics and potent vocal performances, immersing listeners in storytelling that feels both vast and intimately visceral.
Empire surges with a fierce blend, stirring together strains of progressive darkwave, orchestral ethereal, synthpop, futurepop, prog rock, and modern trip-hop. It’s a sprawling world of sound, embodying C Z A R I N A’s intense spirit and vision. This album is her voice unleashed, a force bearing the weight of her life, layered with depth and defiance. Imagine Florence and the Machine, Annie Lennox, Enya, Grace Slick and Loreena McKennitt crossed with the surreal intensity of a Philip K. Dick tale—C Z A R I N A’s vocals resonate like a call to the cosmos, charged and cinematic, woven with the divine feminine.
The album storms open with Rebirth, a transhumanist odyssey where a soul stirs, born anew in strange flesh, jolted into heightened awareness. Here, she conjures an entity both alien and ancient, tethered to a pulse of destiny, grasping for the threads of life with a hunger and a clarity that surges like electricity. This awakening hums with purpose, driving forward, blazing in newfound vitality.
Then comes Dark Star, a symphonic futurepop blast that catapults listeners into cosmic warfare, echoing C Z A R I N A’s love for the grand, mechanized duels of mecha animes. It’s a dark voyage—drifting alone through a vast void, survival flickering like a star. Rising from this cosmic chasm, the speaker ascends as a “Dark Star,” a celestial sentinel forged in darkness, weaponized by resilience, prepared to guard and endure, a beacon in an endless, night-bound expanse.
Ghost Machine erupts onto the stage of a grand vista with a fierce, spiraling energy—a grand cyberpunk uprising intertwined with the battle cries of contemporary Furies, rising against a world perched on the brink of chaos. With pulsating percussive beats and guitar strings that reverberate with electric fervor, this track captures a defiant spirit, poised to both defend and dismantle. It summons the relentless force of fire and grit, rallying against the precipice with an unyielding intensity.
The sci-fi-inspired Exoskeleto charges in like a mechanized beast, echoing the fierce, unbreakable resolve of biomechanical creatures bred for survival. Here, the speaker undergoes a raw transformation—one born of scars, forged through fires, and honed by pain. They cast off old wounds like skin, rising stronger, feral, and relentless, embodying a celestial force armored in exoskeletal strength. This “anomaly from the skies” prowls with animal instinct, driven by survival, unbound by fear—a force awakened, battle-hardened, and poised for yet another fight.
The majestic title track, Empire Follows,” is a soaring masterpiece of art-driven synth that envelops listeners in grand cinematic soundscapes and mesmerizing, surreal folk melodies. It eloquently captures the essence of reclaiming a fallen kingdom, transforming it into something transcendent—something that reaches far beyond the ordinary.
In Metatronica, the album reaches its “phi” moment—a piece structured around the Golden Ratio, invoking sacred geometry and universal unity. Co-producer Von Hertzog enriches this track, amplifying its layered harmonies, and lending it a mournful beauty. Here, Metatronica breathes a wistful, otherworldly longing, calling for oneness through sound and symbol.
Alchemy thunders in, pulsing with bass grooves and ritual cries, stirring the raw elements into a crucible of rebirth. Earth grinds beneath, fire scorches through, water cools, and air swirls—each force drawn from the depths to transform and temper the soul. Here, darkness is not a foe but a furnace, purifying light and forging life anew. Through this cosmic rite, the speaker sheds the weight of past wounds, reborn with strength, emerging as something more alive, more whole—a soul sanctuary shaped in elemental might.
Closing the album, Beyond The Veil unfolds as a spacewave journey, a celestial exploration of love and hope within the vast mechanics of the universe. Quantum mechanics and folded spacetime echo across the track, interwoven with sounds captured from Saturn’s rings by artist China Blue for NASA. Saturn—the ancient god of Time—becomes a vast, pulsing presence, guiding the listener toward higher dimensions and deeper truths.
Listen to Empire below or order here.
Empire rose from C Z A R I N A’s seaside sanctuary in Costa Da Morte, where salt and stormy waves breathe life into her work. With Von Hertzog as co-producer, mixer, and mastering engineer—her trusted hand since Arcana—she layered each track in meticulous sound. The album’s art and videos, conjured by C Z A R I N A and her husband, DeadlyKawaii, under their production house, The Kitsunés, deepen the record’s mystical allure.
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