God, check out that artwork. These guys have the theme down to complete exactness. Looking at their earlier work, their overall concept involves using references to forgotten films of the 1980s, with a heavy leaning towards sci-fi and horror, even a bit of old 80s and 90s comics action in there. And boy do they ever have the sound to back up the image, hot damn. Near Dark, which we’ll assume was titled after the vampire classic, is perfection in dark synthwave. Opening with “Invader”, this one utilizes old-sounding synth work and spectacular programming for its approach. Each song paints a picture with multi-layered electronics. As such, it’s probably the best example of this genre we’ve ever seen around here, because it actually holds the listener for longer than the usual. The clear winner out of all of them is easily “Andromeda”, which opens with sounds of a storm and then the most spectacular beat patterning and electro-melodies on the entire album. -Deaf Sparrow