Cyberpunk Review » 21st Century Slave: Dope Stars Inc.

Music Review By: Mr. Roboto

Year: 2009

Written by: Victor Love

Label: Metropolis

Track Listing:

1. Omegadrones - 6:49
2. 21st Century Slave - 5:36
3. It’s Today - 3:27
4. When I See You Smile - 6:00
5. Digital Warriors - 5:25
6. Megacorps - 3:35
7. Criminal Intents - 3:32
8. Neuromantics - 4:43
9. Outlaw Thrones - 5:14
10. The World Machine - 4:34
11. It’s For You - 3:40

If you’ve never heard of Italy’s cyber-rockers Dope Stars Inc. (DSI for short), you’ve been sleeping in kool-aid for far too long. Victor Love, Fabrice La Nuit, and Darin Yevonde have been rocking and shocking the system since 2004-05 with a the look, sound, and lyrics that could have originated from any William Gibson / Bruce Sterling novel. Just look for and listen to songs like “Infection 13″ and “Vyperpunk” and you’ll see what I mean. For their 3rd full album, DSI has pulled out all the stops with 21st Century Slave, what can be considered a soundtrack for cyberpunk, complete with a manifesto (from DSI’s site):

21st Century Slave: A new manifesto for Digital Warriors, Outlaw Technologists and Console Riders of the 21st Century to survive in a World Machine where sheeple are being totally brainwashed and enslaved by Corporatocracy’s agenda and vicious propaganda.

Around half a century ago a primitive and promising silicon-form of intelligence, the artificial one, was born to be the guide of a new age. We called it Computer. And the world would never be the same again.

Electronic generated domains are the new frontiers. Cyberspace is the battlefield for the upcoming wars against the old and corrupted system that is naturally fading away. The System is collapsing. The System is obviously wrong. The only working System is the one we know as the computer generated one where we share our common interests and views: among the 0 and 1, among the stream of bit and bytes and an ocean of information that can’t be controlled and where all languages, subcultures and lifestyles are merging together. In Cyberspace we are free. In Cyberspace we are the kings. In Cyberspace we are a global Central Processing Unit. No other path to survive: Master Technology.

With technology we’ll be no more slaves of our Century. With Technology we’ll be no more sheeple ruled by questionable, hypocritical and oppressive authority and its obsolete principles. Technology is the cure: It’s the alternative. Technology is our terrific weapon and the network is our realm.

May the words of revolution spread unstoppable at light speed.
Free the energy. Free the information.

And then a day will come
For what you’ve done
For what it’s gone
For every death we’ll strike a bomb on Megacorps.

Of course, it takes more than a manifesto to make a CD cyberpunk, and DSI provides the sound and lyrics to make it so:

Omegadrones. The opening track has Victor declaring his readiness for the impending battle (I, the evolved machine / I, the adamant who thinks / I will battle), and features a sample of a famous movie line (from a movie reviewed here). By the sounds of it, he may be a machine who has seen through the corporate lies and has decided to join the humans.

21st Century Slave. Consider the title track a warning about what is being done to the sheeple… and to you. They just tell you: Eat this shit / And the big amount of flocks / Just don’t care about this.

It’s Today. We’re trapped in a world / That still refuses technology / It’s better to keep slow / And please corporatocracy. Wake up, sheeple, if you want to change the world.

When I See You Smile. Perhaps a reason for the war against the corporatocracy, other than just revenge? I know I’m not alone and I can fall / Straight down / Into your arms to find the force / And rise up. Certainly would make my cyber-war easier to manage.

Digital Warriors. This was the first track I heard from the CD… and I LOVE IT! This could be the hacker’s anthem: We are the children of the zero and one.

Megacorps. They own the crown, and Victor is looking to take it from them. It’s war in the streets with flamethrowers, pump rifles, and bombs.

Criminal Intents. The hackers get another crack (no pun intended) at the corporate system as My criminal intents / Will break the mainframe spear / That’s killing all you dear.

Neuromantics. All the fighting would drive a person insane if they didn’t have a break. For Victor, it seems to come from a bit of VR: A new reality connects through my brain / But all in all that’s the way I need to cut my pain.

Outlaw Thrones. A bit of concern shows regarding what “hope” can deliver. It’s just a dream / It can’t change the world at all.

The World Machine. Death will come for the corrupt leaders, even if it means waiting it out.

It’s For You. Another reminder of what he is fighting for: Someone to make the future for. It’s for you that is worth to die.

Conclusion. Dope Stars may be following the same path taken by the likes of The Cassandra Complex and Billy Idol, they just don’t tread lightly on that path. With several EPs and two albums of practice, DSI has struck a major blow for cyberpunk music. This is one CD you need to have in your collection, especially if you prefer harder music.

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Comments

Very, very bad music, comercial, pop, trash (not the musical gender, the one our mum’s made us put outside to be disposed). Btw i realy like your site and the movie reviews they are great, but this music is plain horrible.
All the best to you keep up the good work.

for me cyberpunk music is something like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJJd32AwZUo

Wow Dzodzo, thanks for the link; I didn’t know this group and it’s pure magic !
Too bad they didn’t tour in europe right now :/

thomas,you are a fool,full stop!
D.S.I RULE,te greatest cyber-punk band ever!!!
”we are the children of 0 & 1”

I really don’t like the lead singer’s voice, but you can’t deny the cyberpunk lyrics. I own all three of Dope Star Inc.’s albums because of that. Just look at the lyrics from “Digital Warriors”:

We are the digital warriors
We are the children of the zero and one

We are the ones who rule the web
We have nobody who commands
Among the bits and bytes we roam we dwell

I agree completely with Thomas (and also Dzodzo). This is a great site, but this music is so bad it almost turned me off cyberpunk. The only music I’ve ever heard that really seemed to fit cyberpunk has been instrumental (e.g. soundtracks to Blade Runner and Deus Ex, and Dzodzo’s link). No matter how ‘cyberpunk’ the lyrics are, coming from a trashy commerical band like this the lyrics will always sound like wank.

where can i download it?

I hope you find that i wasn’t trying to insult anyone, ( hi Vyper-Punk) but i just can’t pass the cheesy techcho beats and the generic lyrics… i mean… come on! this is one step away to being as bad as scooter (and that’s pretty bad)

Also thank you Dzodzo i also didn’t know Ozric Tentacles, count me impressed the have a prog element that i really like.

a few band with a space/cyber feel to it

carbon base lifeforms - /watch?v=Z_8G0zHMuwg
God is a astronaut - /watch?v=d8Gk2kaaFxY&feature=related
Prodigy - /watch?v=EFZbIOXzwu4&feature=related

how could i forget Kraftwerk - /watch?v=3T65NpyfPkQ
They are the pioneers!

That suxxxxxx

Yeah, I’m a huge fan of this band. I read this blog daily. This review alone, just gave cyberpunkreview 5billion kudos, in my book.
Thanks for this! Very great review.

I love the lyrics, but can’t stand the goddamn music. To me, Cyberpunk music would have to be something more like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvDj2DFuofk or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Dlx8t9Yd8g or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12TSRbe5aOA , not this terrible garbage.

Love the lyrics, but this kinda blows. A perfect example of cyberpunk music, in my opinion, would have to be Mutant Message by Juno Reactor:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdjR03z0_Ho

With me any kind of music can have cyberpunk feeling for it and it fits different scenes and settings. It doesn’t matter whether it’s chillout or 80’s style rock, try to compare these, in my opinion both fit in

Blade Runner music by Vangelis:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJrOVLEUBgw

BubbleGum Crisis music:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lz2ae32lc0

Sorry, FLA beats this anyday:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzR53DbL2rs

Good point there Anonymous, i didn’t want to put up such heavy stuff but oh well as you unleashed the industrial beast with FLA i’ll add some although these fit better for the apocalyptic and dark cyberpunk, Zero Signal being the intro music for Carmageddon game

Ministry - New World Order
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87b4a4a2wmY

Fear Factory - Zero Signal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F3RQuWELjj4

to me it´s like this. there is no real musicstyle that is called cyberpunk. there´re just some musicstyles that have allot of stuff that we would call cyberpunk.
to me the closest thing to cyberpunk is industrial just like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtpQRicVFD0
also angelspit is dark and electronic.
but if you like it realy hard and dark you could also call hardcore techno and gabber to cyberpunk. it´s just dark as hell and techno. like this song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HZZbBtVeYjM

numb - entire blood meridian album. misfire!!!rewire!!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-U3Vhtb9_Ls

dsi is ok too. they are way pop tho- i liked their first cd a little, maybe ill check this one out. cheerz

While I am at it, thanks for listing DSI. I am really liking them a lot. Also I’m liking the links you guys posted as comments. Thanks, sorry for spamming if it looks like it!

Mentallo and The Fixer - Commandments For The Molecular Age
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKyK-ufcDrQ

Just listened to Omegadrones for the first time, and absolutely love it. Not even heard the rest yet, but if it’s as good as the opener (which I doubt, but am hoping it’s close.) then I’ll probably be listening to them quite a lot from here on out.

Cheers for posting this up! I’d probably not have found them otherwise.

*groan*
those lyrics suck.

Have had a decent-ish listen to their album now, and completely love some of these tracks, but I’m into metal, industrial and punk so it’s probably easier for me to get into. Saying that though, there’s some tracks I don’t really like, and I also found that I’m not a fan of the way the album’s been mixed as the drums seem way too far back in the mix.

But still, despite the way it’s mixed and me being half and half with the actual tracks overall, I think several of them are truly brilliant, and have been repeat playing them for a while now.

And a huge thanks to the people who’ve linked to what they consider better cyberpunk-type music. There’s some truly insane stuff here! I’ll probably be checking out some of these bands for quite a while yet.

front242 - junkdrome, and numb-desire have hit me instantly. I kind of feel really fortunate to have found this site, post, and comments section, so cheers all.

Cyberpunk music has to have the right feeling for me. It’s not easy to describe, it just is. I rather like Play The Night

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p0u7P7vPQU

and Mecha Love is an obvious one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfjuVCyzToY

Both are by a band I just heard tonight called Haduken!, good stuff in my opinion.

out on Metropolis…I could probably get this on Isotank and I live close enough to their brick and mortar store in Center City Philadelphia that I could take a trip there soon and find it.

Love the band, hate their look. They look like Visual Kei transvestites.

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