PHANTOMIME

Mori Calliope shows a surprising amount of growth on her latest album, "PHANTOMIME".

Well, I'll be damned, Mori blew me away with this one. I'm not the most familiar with Mori, only having heard a select few of her older songs, which I thought sucked, but I also heard her EP, "JIGOKU 6", and while that EP wasn't nearly as egregious as some of her earlier work, it was pretty consistently mediocre. However, here with her newest album, "PHANTOMIME", Mori really grows as an artist, experimenting with more J-Rock and metal elements and with a few tracks even showing her lyrically maturing. Though the album is still not without its problems, that's for sure.

The opening track "タイド" featuring AI, is a genuinely good upbeat J-pop banger. With a super cheerful instrumental, and immediately catchy chorus that I'm sure I won't be able to get out of my head. My only problem here is that I'm still not a fan of Mori's rapping style, thankfully the rap sections on this song are very short and don't really drag down the experience. The production here is also super tight. This serves as a great opener.

The next track, "SNEAKING - revenge" featuring Lotus Juice has a pretty great and well-produced instrumental. The guitar and drum tone, in particular, is phenomenal on this track. Unfortunately, the song is dragged down by the annoying chorus and vocals. The lyricism here is nothing of value since it's just an advertisement for a Metal Gear Solid game. I wish the production had more emphasis on the instrumental rather than the vocals since they just drag down the experience for me. Overall, it's still a cute novelty song with a good instrumental, but it feels a bit like filler and could've used a lot of improvement. It's an enjoyable track though that could grow on me.

The third track, "Go-Getters", is apparently the ending theme for a Suicide Squad Isekai anime... Didn't know that existed and I wish I didn't. Anyways, completely disconnecting the song from that, it's a pretty nice song with some solid production and performances from Mori. I especially love the pre-chorus. Nothing super notable here, but it's an enjoyable listen. Don't really care for the actual chorus though.

The fourth track, "Overkill", is possibly the heaviest track on the album where Mori goes all out on the metal influences. It's a pretty energetic and heavy track. I love the way it transitions from the metal style to the trap metal sound. My only gripe is Mori's vocals don't really have the energy I feel they needed for a track like this. This track in particular is very unique for Mori and I really appreciate her experimenting more on this album.

The next song, "Cult Following", shows Mori delving into some deeper lyricism, and she even goes fully into rap rock, and it absolutely slaps. The production on this track is actually really good, though it is a bit too clean for a song like this I think. Usually, I hate Mori's shouting vocal style, but here it works very well and she absolutely nails the performance. I also love the instrumentation during the bridge, which sounds super dark and brooding.

Up to this point, I was shocked that I was truly enjoying this album, but unfortunately, the album massively drops off in quality with "DONMAI", the sixth track. This song really encompasses a lot of what I disliked with older Mori music, the cartoony-sounding instrumental, theatrical vocal style, and overdramatic lyrics that make it hard to take the song seriously. And the rap verses still cringe me, I'm still not a fan of Mori's rapping, despite it being improved on this album.

The next song, "Midnight Mayoi" featuring Kobo Kanaeru, is essentially a filler track, but it's cute and inoffensive. I think Kobo's voice doesn't work during the verses but sounds good during the chorus. Other than that, the song is just a little boring, uninteresting, bland, and forgettable. But it's not bad, and it can at points be a nice vibe.

The eighth track, "skeletons", shows Mori developing both musically and lyrically, with the instrumental being much slower and simple. It's a striking difference from her usual dense and loud instrumentals. The rap verse on this song is also by far the best rapping I've ever heard from Mori, and the first time I didn't actually hate her rapping at all. And she gets significantly more introspective than ever before on this track. It's really calming and sweet, and I thoroughly enjoy it. This is easily one of the best songs on the album, since its simplicity is such a good contrast from her other music, and creates a super special atmosphere.

The ninth track, "Last Days", is really beautiful and grand. It's easily the most cinematic and dynamic song on the album as it's constantly evolving. Her rapping is yet again solid, and the chorus is super well-produced and gorgeous. Yet again, her lyricism is surprisingly thoughtful and good on this album. I prefer her more sincere style of lyricism, compared to her other songs, which often have very dramatized and edgy lyrics. This is easily my favorite song on the album. The only gripe I have with it is that the trap drums feel just a little out of place.

The closing track, "through the blue", is easily the most simple song on the album, and it's a cute and optimistic closer. While it does drag on a bit long, it's a really sweet sentiment and a nice way to end the project. Very calming.

There is a bonus track that's a remix of "Go-Getters" featuring Yoon. But I won't be rating it here as it's pretty much the same as the original version, and I don't think it's intended to be an official track on the album.

Overall, "PHANTOMIME" is a huge improvement over "JIGOKU 6", both in musicality and writing. This was very good and I could honestly see this growing on me even further with more listens. Mori shows a lot of maturity in lyrical topics and continues to improve her instrumentals with some interesting genre fusions, experimentation, and sincerity. While the highs on this album are surprisingly fantastic with tracks like "タイド", "Overkill", "Cult Following", "skeletons", and "Last Days", there are still quite a few low points for this to be a truly fantastic release, such as "SNEAKING - revenge", "DONMAI", and "Midnight Mayoi". However, most of this is very solid and a good effort from Mori. Overall, I wish the album had less emphasis on vocals in the mix, fewer filler tracks, less bland tracks, and more incredible tracks with lots of experimentation like I loved on this. But despite all its flaws, "PHANTOMIME" truly is a good album, and for the first time ever, I'm excited to see what Mori does next.
-----------------------------------------------------
FAVORITE TRACK: Last Days
LEAST FAVORITE TRACK: DONMAI
-----------------------------------------------------