Band:	Deathstars
Album:	Synthetic Generation
Style:	Industrial gothic metal
Release date:	May 2003
A review by:	Undercraft

01. Semi-Automatic
02. Synthetic Generation
03. New Dead Nation
04. Syndrome
05. Modern Death
06. Little Angel
07. The Revolution Exodus
08. Damn Me
09. The Rape Of Virtue
10. Genocide
11. No Light To Shun
12. White Wedding [Billy Idol cover] [limited edition bonus]
13. Our God The Drugs [limited edition bonus]
+ Synthetic Generation [video] [limited edition bonus]
+ Syndrome [video] [limited edition bonus]

Electro Metal is a very well established Metal sub-genre such as, let's say Viking Metal or Folk Metal, this particular sub-genre has the ability of molding with most of the "typical" genres of Metal, such as Black Metal, Death metal, Trash, Power etc. In this case Deathstars deliver a synthesizer-driven Electro Gothic Metal .

This might not be the heaviest thing around this days, and for me not the most easy to digest, at first listen I didn't like this one, but after a few spins of "background" music while I played some games, I started to like this?

Deathstars are playing, like I said, Gothic Metal with a lot of synthesizers as a back up, the voice goes from the typical deep, dark Gothic voice to some shrieks here and there, the formula works because Deathstars have composed god songs with the most catchiest riffs and choruses, god knows how many times I hummed one or two of this songs for a entire day!

The album starts with "Semi-Automatic" a very catchy song (as many songs of this album), this song could be easily be placed in the latest album of The Kovenant, some songs reminded me of Paradise Lost while other reminded me of Rammstein, as you can see, the range of influences is quite broad.

The title track "Synthetic Generation" follows the same path of the previous song, but lacks some aggression, now I'm thinking "hope the whole album doesn't follow the same path?" My prayers are listening with "New Dead Nation" a more aggressive song, more complete, with a very catchy guitar riff.

We slow things down to listen "Syndrome" a mid paced song, kinda melancholic, I don't know, you have to be in the mood to listen this one?"Modern Death" is next, this one is one of my favorites songs in the album, now the voice of the singer is sounding like one of those 80's Goth bands. "Little Angel" closes the first half of the album, and this one has to be the catchiest song in the whole album, if you want to know what Deathstars are all about, I strongly recommend this one, it has a creepy "la la la la la" before the chorus.

The next half of the Cd, you have more catchy songs, cool riffs and a lot of electronica, although I liked the first half better, the second half is also good. The Cd ends with a very pleasant surprise, a cover of Billy Idol's "White Wedding", excellent song, and a superb cover done by these guys.

Well, fans of The Kovenant, Paradise Lost and Rammstein get this one immediately, you won't be disappointed, and for all of you who doesn't like Electro Metal, well, prepare yourself because this is a sub-genre that is taking the world by surprise, and I can predict that 2004 is going to bring a lot of new bands doing this, just be prepared for the electro storm.