Well, “resurrection” may be a strong word in this case, given that the mistress was more Psylocked into existence than anything else, but I digress. We remember the disbanding, and then the announcement, and the first MV and feeling like, hey, this thing could do a thing, let’s see where that all lands, and then hey look today it’s time for the second installment!

Or, more correctly, all of the second installment

Again, where the heck did the mistress* suddenly acquire the cash to do ~competent CG in their video? I realize that a crafty intern with the right software and a free afternoon can do quite a bit these days, but have you even seen the usual degree of creativity in these things? It’s pretty much exactly like what the the mistress members** do in this MV, except applied to the graphics and stuff.

I’m genuinely trying to get a handle on the mistress after this one. Once the purveyors of the nastiest track of the idol season, they went all-in on the digital thing by working with PassCode’s composer (and spawned a great joke that I made on other people’s behalfs). The astute observer might point out how the things that mistress, pre the, did with their sounds could pair up really well with digicore, adding a darker and more threatening edge. One could make a good argument that Dark PassCode would be a good thing for the scene to have! And then the mistress could spend an entire season brooding over the other group’s popularity and soliloquize (perhaps via song) about their fragile psyche and unrequited need for acceptance and thirst for blood and really raise the tension as we wonder OMG WILL THEY REALLY ATTACK SENPAI!? only for the penultimate episode forcing them to work together with PassCode to save Angel Grove from a rogue Red Ranger and man did this metaphor get weird.

For real, though, did they pick up NEVE SLIDE DOWN’s manager at some point?

The thing is, I’m thinking that the mistress isn’t there yet, or not where they’re deliberately trying to be. There’s too much competence in the track for it to be bad; that chorus is, yes par for the course, but also a well-fished-with hook. So what is i– oh, yeah, it’s what’s passing for harsh vocals, isn’t it? Not something to tip-toe around, and yet.

Still, an overall good start is afoot, and I have a feeling that the mistress will get their legs before too long. They’re getting no shortage of attention (by idol standards), so it may only be a matter of time before their actual noise is complemented by proverbial noise.

*There’s just something about typing out the name that way, as a common noun with an article, that makes me giggle as my brain strips away all context

**Also it gives you opportunities to be grammatically correct when writing clauses like this