"Monarch of Monsters" - Vylet Pony | REVIEW

Before we get started I’d like to say that "Monarch of Monsters" contains themes of blood/gore, murder, self-harm, suicide, nudity, sexual content, sexual assault, sexual violence, cannibalism, and existential/cosmic horror, while also containing the f-slur. This is shown in its lyrics and artwork, and will also be covered in this review due to its importance in the album, if you are uncomfortable with any of these themes, please click off this review.

If you joke about the artwork or contents of this album, I hate you. I hate you no matter what type of person you are, no matter what your views are, no matter if I’ve talked to you or not. If you have joked about this album in any capacity, it is clear that you are immature and cannot truly examine and study art. There are so many comments under the page for this album saying shit like “Freaky ass cover” and other stuff in a “haha funny sex” tone, and I find that disgusting. If you have joked about this album or its contents, click off this review and never interact with me ever.

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“Monarch of Monsters” is the 18th full length LP for one of the most important artists in my life, Vylet Pony, and oh my god, is it an amazing one. This 12 track, 84 minute SPECTACLE of an album is just an insane ride the whole way through. Track after track this album just got better and better, it improves with each listen as well, and I want to pay this album it's dues, and attempt to give it the best possible review I can, because this album means a lot to me, even though it hasn’t even been released to the public at the time I’m writing this.

This album’s narrative is one of the most ambitious narratives, and the most mature narrative we’ve seen throughout the entire Vylet Pony canon, and what she has done on this record should be commendable, no matter how you feel about My Little Pony, or its community. I will try to talk about the narrative the best I can but I might end up getting caught up with the sonic aspects of the album, as they are what people pay attention to the most. If you want to read the narrative to the album, go to vyletpony.com/monarch-novella as it improved my listening experience way more after reading it.

If you are a casual listener of Vylet, you haven’t been listening to the singles or keeping up with album news, I bet than anything past the first or second track completely bewildered you, don’t worry it happened to me too, and I’m a very avid fan of Vylet and her work, she’s one of if not my very favorite artist right now, and “Monarch of Monsters” left me almost completely speechless. Most people probably know her from “CUTIEMARKS” and “fish whisperer” and maybe even “Girls Who Are Wizards” so I know for a FACT that they were taken aback by the later tracks.

This album documents the very end of the life of Vylet Cypress, more commonly known as Wolf or the Monarch of Monsters, and how she became the companion and lover of Aria, also known as The Huntress or The Far Seer. The very end of Wolf’s life was quite the awful thing for Aria to behold, even if they were only able to view the final year of Wolf’s life. Vylet says that every lyric on this album is from Wolf’s point of view, and every word is directed toward herself, and is said in hatred.

“Pest” covers the slaughter of Starlight Glimmer, and how she was the final victim of Wolf’s murders. This first track is one of the lightest on the album, both lyrically and sonically, and the fact it’s one of the lightest with the lyrics it has is amazing due to what happens in this song, and what is said in this song. Lyrics like “. The knife you had brandished won’t wait till you’re dead. / Oh it’s nothing, it’s only borrowed time.” and “What’s the point of saving the world or yourself / When the greatest villain is you?” stick out to me in particular, Aria’s narration at the end also deserves to be noted, but noting it isn’t enough, I’ll just quote it.

“Yes ‘They’ were the very same. ‘Wolf then. And Wolf now’. She staggered back from her mirror, eyes red as the moon. ‘They’ could not be estranged. And so…

Wolf cried.”

“PLAY DEAD! PLAY DEAD!” is about Wolf’s guilt for every sin she has committed across her lifetime, and her complete repression of her entire life up to the point of her encounter with Starlight. This track was admittedly my least favorite on the album with the first few listens, as certain parts of it sonically just threw me off, particularly the electronic intro after the ending of “Pest”. In hindsight, however, this is one of my favorite tracks by Vylet, across her whole discography.

The instrumental is absolutely fantastic, but that’s somewhat expected after the instrumental that “Pest” brought, but what I want to highlight is the vocals from Vylet. The delivery on lines like the “Mama? Can't you see?” at the end of her repeating “What is happening to me?” and also the final “Gotta take it like the bitch I am, and just play dead!” are some of my favorite moments of vocal delivery ever, with Vylet bellowing out these lines with such visceral emotion it left me stunned in my seat with subsequent listens.

“The Heretic (Woe is Me)” continues the theme of the previous track with Wolf being consumed by her own guilt and constantly reminding herself of her sins so as to not forget them. This track is where things start to go from great to fantastic, as we are consumed by an amazing instrumental, alongside some of my favorite writing from Vylet ever.

I can’t say much about this track without reiterating what I’ve already said for previous tracks, the instrumentation is once again fantastic, Vylet’s vocals are phenomenal, the writing is astounding, “Well woe is me, I can't deny. / Selfish is the heart that shrouds my mind. / Well woe is me, my sinful life. / Heretic concealed by light.” hits me hard in particular because of the spectacular delivery from Vylet.

“Survivor’s Guilt” is similarly about Wolf’s guilt, but more her guilt for surviving manipulation, and then going on to be the only one of her friends left alive after her murder spree. This song goes CRAZY, I’ll just say that now, it opens with an insanely groovy bassline which is then followed by more fantastic instrumentation on Vylet’s part. The vocals here are also insane, with Vylet belting out vocals on the regular, also including great pitch shifts that give me insane chills no matter how many times I hear them.

The writing here is also on point, with lines like “Driven by self preservation, when I could be your prey. / How am I different? / How am I different? / Different from the wounds I pried.” hitting my right in the gut with their insane delivery that could almost definitely transcend language and rock anyone to their core.

“Vitality Glitch” is about Wolf loading near all desire to continue her life, as guilt from her past actions overwhelms her and takes over her mind. This is personally my least favorite track on the album but it is by no means bad, far from it, this actually has some of my favorite writing on the first half of the album.

Lines like, “I am what they made me, yet I've always had control. / Settled by sin, yes, I've always played my role.” as well as, “ And even if the flames have long burned out, spare no kindness to the wolf that howls.” I particularly love because of the way I feel they perfectly capture Wolf’s feelings around this point in the story.

“The Wallflower Equation” is once again about Wolf reflecting upon her past, yet not out of guilt, but instead out of anger. She begins to truly resent the people who have wronged her and the actions that they caused her to partake in. The staggering 12 minute length of this track truly represents the raw, unfiltered emotion Wolf is feeling at this time, as her sins eat away at her life maggots to a corpse.

This is tied with a later track on the album as my favorite for a multitude of reasons. The ever evolving instrumental is one of the best I’ve ever heard, the writing is on par if not better with the rest of the album up to this point, the vocal delivery on this track is stupendous, I genuinely believe that there isn’t a single problem with this track.

“Princess Cuckoo” is the heaviest song on the album, sonically and lyrically, with it covering how just mere days before she were to take her own life in front of her followers, she was subdued and raped, for what could’ve possibly been days. I’m not going to review this song, I am going to talk about this song, I will tell you about the instrumentals and the lyrics, but I will not be giving my opinion on it, as I do not feel comfortable doing so.

This track is one of the most vile songs I have ever heard, and I mean that with the highest praise. Upon my first listen to this album, this track drew me to nausea. The only semblance of organization throughout most of the track is a bassline that rocks you to your core as Vylet gives out an insanely emotional vocal performance that left me stunned. Other instruments do occasionally join in on each beat but it’s not as organized or consistent as the bass. Vylet calms down as some sort of woodwind takes control, before both her and the instrument become more and more chaotic and disjointed. Vylet begins to weep as she repeats “This is how you grow up” while the instrumental devolves into chaos.

Vylet’s final coherent sentence is “And everyone looked away as I believed them.“ before the instrumental begins to rock, Vylet’s grunts, moans, and breaths follow along, before she starts bellowing out repetitions of the line “Feathers like peacocks.” with the final line of the song being “And you think I’d just forget?” before Wolf howls, and the instrumental dissolves into madness. This track has a feeling placed upon the listener that cannot be put into words.

“Sludge” is the longest track on the album, and the longest track in Vylet’s discography, being a staggering 22 minutes long, and having 13 separate movements. This track is about Wolf’s suicide, and how the followers of the Monarch of Monsters reduced her to nothing afterwards. The sheer atmosphere presented on this track is enough for it to be considered one of my favorites in Vylet’s catalog, with a large portion of this instrumental sounding like it was ripped straight out of hell.

This song sounds like insanity at points, with instrumentals layered upon each other to the point where they’re indistinguishable, and vocals so insanely harsh that Vylet herself has said at points that her throat had begun to bleed. All 13 movements of this track are like having different bones in your body shattered before your eyes, it’s actually insane how she managed to craft this song together.

Once again the writing is absolutely amazing, with various lyrical sections like, “Am I the master of my fate? / Or will this carrion of hate / embalm my ever writhing psyche in a box of blood red tape?” as well as, “They pluck my feathers, make it sting. / Strip my body, gouge my chest, / they rape me 'till there's nothing left. / Love and tolerate this mess, / defile and crush my every breath.“ leaving me completely stunned.

The song closes with the line, “And the last thing they heard was: ‘Awoo, awoo, awoo’” before the instrumental explodes into one of my favorites if not my very favorite instrumental I’ve heard across any song by any artist. The weight of it is absolutely crushing, as pounding drums echo throughout your head, and layers upon layers of distorted guitar shred up your eardrums. This moment in particular is when I realized that this is not just my favorite album of the year, but one of my favorite albums of all time.

“Revenge Fantasy” covers Wolf being transported to the Lotus after her death, but before she was given her physical form, as she floats in the afterlife recounting her past. She remembers her life as Vylet Cypress, before she had transformed into Wolf, and she proclaims “You should have pulled the trigger when you had the chance.”

Once again the explosive instrumental of this track is a highlight, with a weight so crushing I wouldn’t be surprised if you were to tell me it broke one of your bones, the vocal deliveries and lyrics here are fantastic as well, with parts like, “To hurt and be hurt. / To love and be loved. / To hate and be hated. / To kneel before the blade. / ‘You will always be a monster’. / I know, but I am your monster no longer.” being particularly impactful to my listening experience.

“Huntress” is about Wolf’s ascension into immortality at the hands of Aria, and how she became Aria’s hunting dog and lover. The instrumental is noticeably calmer than the tracks that came before it, which fits the freeing tone of this track, as Wolf has finally been freed of her torturous life, as she is able to live for all of eternity with her love.

As I’ve said time and time again, the writing on this song is spectacular, with lines like, “Huntress in the night, / I have longed for you all my life. / Show me your desires. / As I kneel before you, / my feathers do soften.” as well as, “Baptized in soft snow, / I begin to drift like in a dream, / And everything I am congeals in warmth.” sticking out to me in particular.

“...And, as Her Howl Echoed Unto Eventide, She Became the Far Seer’s Hunting Dog...” is completely instrumental, and god what an instrumental it is. Pounding drums fill your ears as Vylet’s guitar weeps into your ears, serenading you with its cries. A wall of noise this thick and with this much weight isn’t a first for this album, but after the journey we’d just endured, this breathes free through the wind as a moment of clarity.

“Rest Now, Little Wolf (A Vigil for Aria; or, How the Lamb Stood in an Empty Room Filled with Empty Friends)” tells a story ripped straight from Vylet’s REM cycle, as it recounts the dream where the character of Aria was created. A theremin softly hums as Aria calms you with the words, “Rest now, little Wolf. Love has not vanished from the world, just yet. Tender truth can be bestowed unto those who know your song. Yes. We tread a fine weave of gray, yet many perish to the blade's doubled edge. Conceal not your mistakes, but allow them to be a sputtering torch. Illuminate the path for those that follow. To be gentle, to be kind.”

Wolf awakes in an endless hallway with repeating patterns of rooms and office supplies, numbered doors lining the walls, cold and alone. She wanders these halls endlessly searching for Aria as a form of comfort during a time of unease and confusion. She stumbles upon the only door with any activity, 327, and is greeted by some sort of stallion she can’t quite recognize, as she enters in search of Aria.

Wolf finds Aria and a short moment of tension between the two begins, before Aria extends their hand, asking wolf to a dance. As they dance, Aria says, "My lament has not once ceased since we last met” and as they dance, Aria begins to recite Wolf’s previous transgressions and actions against Aria and the other people affiliated with them. The two begin to cry together as they continue dancing, Aria still reciting sin after sin, before eventually uttering words of forgiveness, before wolf asks for forgiveness, burying her face in Aria’s chest to cry. Aria now sat on the floor, Wolf’s head resting upon their legs, as they began to stroke wolf’s fur, the only words they said were, “Rest now, little Wolf.”

And Wolf obeyed.

This album tells a story so coherently through its lyrics alone it should be at least respected by everyone who’s heard it, and commended by anyone who’s listened to it in full. I truly believe that this album has the ability to shift the landscape when it comes to review culture, solely because of the sheer scope of an album made by a pony artist, no disrespect to Vylet, all disrespect to the doubters.

“Monarch of Monsters” by Vylet Pony is an album that I truly don’t think that there is anything like, and there won’t ever be anything like it, and if something is made like it, it won’t reach nearly the same heights that “Monarch of Monsters” did. This album is truly one of a kind, both for Vylet, and for music in general. I’m fully expecting this album to get the praise it deserves, I don’t know if it did at the time I’m writing this however, as the album has yet to release.

It’s abhorrently clear how much time and effort Vylet put into this album to make sure it was truly her best work, and I hope that everyone reading this can agree that it is her best. I don’t believe in objectivity, but with lyricism, instrumentation, production, and storytelling like this, I’d be genuinely shocked to see anyone say that this isn’t her best album.

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Included below is what Vylet wrote in the lyric booklet for “Monarch of Monsters” about how the album came together, and why she created it. I’ve only included this because I know not everyone will read the booklet.

“‘Monarch of Monsters’ is an allegory for how trauma, loneliness, and selfishness can turn you into a horrible person; it's about endeavouring to stay alive even within a terminal state of regret; how — in this regret — experiencing any happiness at all feels insincere and undeserved; about perpetuating cycles of toxicity and wickedness because it's all you've known, especially in denial of being wrong; and ultimately, learning to find purpose and self-love in that din. Well, I exist in that regret. In the past, I have been that horrible person. I live with the knowledge that I've been someone who has perpetuated cycles of toxicity, jealousy, oppression, sexualization, bigotry, queerphobia, and overall personal insecurity. I survive, knowing that I have hurt many people in my life and have, at times, compensated in acting as the sort of villain that I have sworn my life against. To grow up lonely on the internet, to be taken advantage of by strangers, to be accepted into a space where these behaviours dominate the collective mindset, and to find fellowship in all ‘the wrong places ruined me for a very long time. Though I became a part of the MLP community when I was 13, I don't know at what point I should have known better and just grown up to become the person I should have been the whole time. ‘Monarch of Monsters’ is an album and story I've wanted to write for a very long time because it's far more value to face it and discuss it openly, rather than fear it. Creating this began as an exploration of the most profound punishment I could wish upon myself, and yet finding purpose for the life I've lived so far. I'm not interested in pretending my past doesn't exist. I want to guide people instead, knowing the things I know. To kill a monster is to be a monster, once in service to the sinister call, then finally in service to those who must be protected. One must not lose themselves completely. The lyrics of ‘Monarch of Monsters’ are written from the perspective of the eponymous antihero, ‘Wolf’ (or, Vylet Cypress). The prose is better understood through reading the accompanying novella, which is included in the Bandcamp booklet. If you are reading this and do not have access to the booklet, or wish to otherwise read it elsewhere for whatever your reasons are, you may visit vyletpony.com/monarch-novella to read it in full. The album's lyrics, sung from Wolf's perspective, are directed primarily at either her former or present self. The instances in which this is not the case presents — instead — Wolf parasocially addressing both loved ones and enemies from throughout her life. These ideas all parallel my mental states from the present, back through many years. Throughout the album, I am having many internal dialogues with the various, discretized selves that live within me, past and present. I am also considering many of the people who have hurt me, and especially the people that I have hurt. I want to emphasize that the varied instances of murder, sexual violence, self-harm, and other severe occurrences in the album and its story are not expressed intending to condone or endorse. Aria is an invention of my dreams. After the release of Carousel at the start of 2023, the existential regret and remorse that my life has become permeated with caused me to relapse into a severe mental health crisis. I had long been suffering from severe trauma memory suppression, and I spent several weeks clawing through everything I could to uncover the things my brain was preventing me from remembering. Please note: DO NOT DO THIS EVER WITHOUT A THERAPIST. I regretted doing that so terribly. And so my descent began. Among the symptoms of the resulting mental health crisis was a critical, unbearable insomnia. In the sleep that I did manage to get during this period, my dreams had become immensely vivid. There were periods where I was awake for 4 days at a time, and the sleeps which bookended these periods were hallucinatory. Sometime in the Spring or Summer, I had a dream about a strange place, with strange people. Somehow I knew there was a person called Aria in that place, and asked around for them. Eventually, I was led into the room where Aria was, and they appeared as someone I had known a long time ago. The person they looked like in the dream wasn't a close friend or anything, it was someone I had scarcely known in my past. It was clear that, in the dream, I had hurt them long ago, and they had been aware even more of the awful person I had progressed into afterward. They asked that I describe every mistake and malevolence I had ever committed throughout my entire life in front of them, so I did. Then at once I had performed this abstract penance before them, and they finished crying and smiled. In the dream, they said they forgave me, and that everything was okay. I laid down, and they stroked my fur, and I only realized then that I had fur all over my body. They said, ‘rest now, little wolf’ and then I began to fall asleep inside the dream as they softly mingled with the other people in the room. The original idea for Monarch was to be an antithetical album to Queen of Misfits. Where Queen of Misfits was like ‘woe is me’ kind of stuff, I wanted Monarch to be ‘woe is they’, about all the pain I've caused other people, and the cycles that both caused and were produced by these things. So, the idea was originally to focus on Starlight Glimmer, since the other record focused on Trixie Lulamoon. After the dream, though, I abandoned this pursuit and shifted the entire album into a direction informed by the dream. It became clear as I mulled over it a lot that I clearly had been subconsciously inspired by Kindred from League of Legends too, Wolf and Lamb being some of my favourite characters in fiction. At first, I wanted to avoid this comparison and try to do something different, but it just felt right to allow that duality to exist in the end. ‘What if 'Kindred', but it's sapphic and even more rancid and existential?’ was a sort of thesis that became of the project. Fastforward almost 2 years since I had started working on Monarch, and the album and its story has become a centerpiece for the universe(s) I've been trying to build with my mainline projects. It's become grander and more profound in ways I could not have imagined. And it helps me solve a few narrative issues I've been facing, especially continuity discrepancies within the Vylet Pony lore. Well. Aria has become something of a spiritual ‘reality’ for me. I'm not superstitious, and I prefer to engage the world from an empirical, studied view. That being said, there is something that comforts me and encourages me to move forward with thinking of Aria as a real god, watching over me and being by my side. Perhaps they're watching o'er you too, dear reader. I've been in therapy for two years now. It has allowed me to develop tremendously and learn so much about myself. This is the album I wrote throughout these past two years in rehabilitation.”

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