A Review of the Album ``Lunaria'' by Danimal Cannon Under review is another album of music I've liked, available for listening and purchase on Bandcamp: https://danimalcannon.bandcamp.com/album/lunaria This isn't the first album I've enjoyed from this artist, but it's my favourite album of his. Retro and techno both describe the genre of most tracks well enough, and few of the tracks contain vocals. The album entries follow ordered by my preference, their names, their durations, and album ordering: Long Live The New Fresh 04:26 03 = Surveillance 04:56 08 > Lunaria (feat. Emily Yancey) 04:43 02 > Postlude (feat. Emily Yancey) 01:46 11 > Halo of Dust 03:26 09 > Coalesce 05:24 10 > Red Planet 06:31 07 > Behemoth 03:38 05 > Interlude 01:12 06 > Collision Event 05:53 04 = Axis 06:37 01 > Axis (piano version feat. Shnabubula) 06:18 12 The first and longest track is a strong opening to the album, even though I usually skip it. It has a repetitive opening that feels like the musical equivalent of a waterfall, with a drop shortly past the first minute before calm returns. A basic melody is nearly omnipresent throughout, occasionally broken by short segments I find hard to describe and which often include guitars. The melody starts to shift between instruments as the song progresses. After the fourth minute, the song takes a very different path for a bit, reminiscent of a death in a video game. My waterfall analogy serves well, as quite a bit of this song is noise-like, however pleasant, inbetween its primary melody. The last and third-longest track is a piano cover thereof and unfortunately reveals the weakness of this kind of music; I can recognize the melody and whatnot in the piano alone, but the song's simply not quite as pleasant to hear without the wild instruments and whatnot. I believe this quality holds not with quite a few of the other tracks in this album, but it's certainly stayed in my mind since I noticed. The second track begins with a tune which reminds me of a graveyard or other spooky area, and is one of the few tracks featuring vocals. Despite its status as the title song, I find the lyrics cryptic and can't understand quite a few of them, but it matters little. Halfway through, the song abandons all instruments but a very basic drum as in an old video game console, before the vocals return, and before all other instruments return in full-force; it makes for a nice effect. The final minute and bit is perhaps the most pleasant in the song, again using the effect of stripping the song bare, but less bare, and returning all else at once before dying out; it very nicely segues to the next track. The third track is my favourite in the entire album, with perhaps the exception of the eighth, which is a near second. I prefer the version of this song released as a single, as it lacks the artifical voice known by the name ``Hatsune Miku'' present in some sections of this version, but it's also not different enough for me to switch over when listening to this album. This track may be what made me aware of the artist, as the other release is in a video game soundtrack I've heard. The song starts with a basic instrument and basic tune, before using another, and then opening a vortex with another simple instrument, giving the impression of a buildup; afterwards, the track's true melody is heard, although occasionally the simple opening returns. This is another song made more appealing with the wild instruments, but I can't hold that against this particular track. I can't listen to this track without thinking of the fighting scene in the video game, which effectively serves as a music video. The fourth track is slow and remains slow largely until the halfway point. It almost sounds like an elegy in its opening, with a whining instrument like a stringed instrument. A guitar is added as it gets faster. I find this track a little difficult to describe; it sounds like a different song once the second half takes hold, even after repeating parts of the first half in slightly different ways. The fifth track starts out strong, and stays that way. It sounds like more of a ``collision event'' than the fourth track, certainly. This track is also difficult to describe beyond a series of quick beats set against basic tunes for most of the track, and not quite so quick beats for the remainder. The sixth track sounds like an Internet store's theme song, and is a simplification of track eleven. The seventh track begins in an eerie way, which pairs very well with its name set in space. About a quarter of the way through, the song explodes into many different instruments. Halfway through, the instruments and tune change for a bit to something I suppose can be compared to a garbage compactor. The final third loses most of its instruments and continues with something not eerie, before a final travel through its familiar tune. As with previous albums I've reviewed, finding so many songs hard to describe adequately seems to be a bad sign. As with many other tracks, this one dies out to end. The eighth track starts with guitar and nice drums, and is another contender for my favourite track, also being one with vocals; what touched me most about this track was its lyrics, once I bothered to understand them. It's a song about that omnipresent surveillance in modern society, with references to whistleblowers, ``too big to fail'', and other telltale phrases. Unlike every other track in the album, I get an impression that the song exists to support the lyrics, and not the other way around. The lyrics are interrupted with strong hits from some pleasant instrument, and it even has a chorus. The ninth track reminds me of the fourth, as it also starts out slow and with a similar selection of instruments, but it picks up perhaps a little more a little more quickly. Regardless, it returns to its usual tune soon thereafter, and the song has less variation between segments relative to others. The tenth track vaguely reminds me of the seventh, but less eerie. The song keeps a similar tune up to its second third, at which point it changes a tad, first to near-silence and then to a fuller set of instruments than it had. The final third has the track end and seemingly begin a different song, but then it continues much in the way it had beforehand; the final minute of this track is the best. The eleventh track still resembles an Internet store's theme song, but this time it also has lyrics. I nowadays mostly listen to the album for my two favourite tracks, although I occasionally listen to the others. There are certain video game soundtracks which, given the appropriate treatment, ascend to high art; I'm not certain this album does so, relying so much on its instruments, but I enjoy it. I'm beginning to think reviewing music of this type so to be a waste of time, all things considered. .