Well... poop.
- "Good evening. Come in, come in. Sit close.
We have a guest for you.
An Alien.
A creature from the fourth dimension."
Dark Matters is the second disc of Z2, the 2014 two-disc studio album by Devin Townsend, and is sequel to the 2007 album Ziltoid the Omniscient.
The album is a concept album about an extraterrestrial being named Ziltoid, who has infiltrated Earth society, pretending to be a beloved rock star in a costume, until he is outed as an alien. Meanwhile, a poozer from the planet Titan in Ziltoid's custody escapes and returns home, attracting the attention of Queen Blataria the War Princess. Now the forces of Titan are gearing to invade Earth and Ziltoid must join with the humans in protecting it and its supply of coffee.
Tracklist:
- "Z2" (3:59)
- "From Sleep Awake" (3:00)
- "Ziltoidian Empire" (6:26)
- "War Princess" (8:18)
- "Deathray" (4:43)
- "March of the Poozers" (5:18)
- "Wandering Eye" (3:41)
- "Earth" (7:39)
- "Ziltoid Goes Home" (6:20)
- "Through the Wormhole" (3:44)
- "Dimension Z" (6:13)
Personnel:
- Devin Townsend: Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Keyboards, Programming
- Dave Young: Guitars, Keyboards
- Brian "Beevis" Waddell: Bass
- Ryan van Poederooyen: Drums
- Mike Young: Keyboards
- Anneke van Giersbergen: Vocals (backing)
- Dominique Lenore Persi - Voice of Blattaria
- Chris Jericho - Voice of Captain Spectacular
- Bill Courage - Voice of the narrator
Ziltoid commands you to read his tropes!
- Adaptational Non Sapience: The Planet Smasher had his own song on the original album and told Ziltoid to get lost at the end of it. Here, he's just an animal, albeit one that has a very powerful roar and still hates musicals.
- Alien Invasion: By Blataria and her Poozers in Deathray and March of the Poozers.
- Alternate Continuity: The original Ziltoid album had Ziltoid destroy Earth and ended with an All Just a Dream ending. This album makes no mention of its predecessor, save for a Brick Joke near the end about the Planet Smasher's Berserk Button.
- Anti-Hero: Ziltoid.
- Ascended Extra: Captain Spectacular, on the original Ziltoid album, had two songs dedicated to him piloting the surviving humans to safety on another planet while briefly pursued by Ziltoid and his crew, and then then he disappeared for the rest of the story. Captain Spectacular has a much bigger role here.
- Audience Participation Song: Z2 and Dimension Z are unsual examples, given the fact that the audience participates on the album.
- Berserk Button: The Planet Smasher. He hates musicals!
- Big Bad: Queen Blattaria is the one who leads the alien invasion.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Why am I talking to myself??
- Brick Joke: The Planet Smasher's hatred of musicals was a throwaway line in his song on the original Ziltoid album. It comes back here as a plot point in the climax.
- Call-Back: The Poozer speech in Deathray is one to Ziltoidia Attaxx!! from Ziltoid the Omniscient.
- Chronic Villainy: Ziltoid simply can't seem to keep away from being evil.
- Crowd Song: A lot of them, with two different crowds:
- The Poozers on Deathray and March of the Poozers.
- The humans on Z2 and Dimension Z.
- Did You Actually Believe...?: Well, he signed it in pencil.
- With his left hand!
- Empathic Weapon: Herman the Planet Smasher! He uses a special kind of Breath Weapon ...
- The Empire: Queen Blattaria's Poozer empire on Titan.
- Enemy Mine: Ziltoid is forced to team up with Captain Spectacular and the forces of Earth when Blataria invades.
- Evil Matriarch: Despite whatever she says, the War Princess clearly doesn't care about her poozer children. In-fact the narrator says that she is outright revolted by them. That said, she noticed when one of them happened to be missing (the one being held captive by Ziltoid). Considering that there's apparently millions of them, Blataria noticing the absence of just one is pretty impressive.
- Evil Plan: Ziltoid has an extraordinarily devilish one, pretending to be Captain Spectacular's ally and betraying him in the moment of truth!
- Evil Versus Evil: The War Princess vs. Ziltoid.
- Forced Transformation: The humans hit by the Deathray are turned into Poozers.
- God Save Us from the Queen!: That is, saving Earth from Queen Blattaria.
- Harsh Vocals: Devin uses some growls on the album, especially on Ziltoid Goes Home.
- Heel–Face Turn: Ziltoid makes one when he learns that Captain Spectacular is his half brother.
- "I Want" Song: War Princess. Queen Blattaria really wants that coffee.
- Laughably Evil: Ziltoid and Queen Blattaria are two different shades of this.
- Lighter and Softer: It's precursor is much more abrasive in production and overall atmosphere, though this album still has its fair share of heavy moments. Story-wise, it counts as well. On the original Ziltoid album, Ziltoid destroys the world relatively early, whereas this story ends with the world being saved. The album also plays up the Camp that was present on the original album.
- Limited Lyrics Song: Zig-zagged with half the songs - "Z2", "From Sleep Awake", "Ziltoidian Empire", "Wandering Eye", and "Earth" - as most of them are very dialogue/narration heavy, but the "raw"
version of the album shows that they only have a handful of lyrics without the spoken parts. - Million Mook March: The March of the Poozers!
- Must Have Caffeine: Just like in Ziltoid the Omniscience, coffee is still treated as Applied Phlebotinum that Ziltoid is after. Here though, Queen Blataria learns about it from one of her poozers and begins to desire it too.
- Related in the Adaptation: The original Ziltoid album gave no indication that Ziltoid and Captain Spectacular were half brothers.
- Repeating So the Audience Can Hear: Blattaria does this at the beginning of "War Princess" with the Poozer that had just escaped from Ziltoid's captivity."So you're saying, [Ziltoid's] home planet is dying? ...and he needs to find a suitable place to colonize?"
- Self-Backing Vocalist: Since it's Devin, this is a given, BUT it's not as frequent as on other albums, since the choir on several songs was sung by fans from around the world.
- Sequel Escalation: It's much bigger in scale than Ziltoid the Omniscient, adding one villain and a whole alien race to invade Earth with Insterstellar Weapons.
- Sequel Hook: The album ends with Ziltoid and Blattaria being sucked through a wormhole and waking up on a distant celestial body, along with a single bag of coffee. The narrator then says that this story is To Be Continued...
- Spoken Word in Music: A lot of the songs are dominated by dialogue/narration, with "Ziltoid Goes Home" being the only aversion (though "Deathray", "March of the Poozers", and "Dimension Z" have their spoken parts tagged at their ends). "Through the Wormhole" was omitted from the "raw" version of the album due to it consisting almost solely of dialogue.
- That Reminds Me of a Song: Mmmmeeeeemoryyy..!
- Villain Song: War Princess is this for Queen Blattaria.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Ziltoid at the beginning. It doesn't last long.
- Wham Line: "We have - the same - mother!" - "Woah!!"
- World of Ham: Unlike the last album, this one has a much more campy, tongue in cheek feeling to it, making it seem more like a cheesy 50s sci-fi movie. Aside from Ziltoid himself we now have Captain Spectacular (unsurprising considering he's voiced by Chris Jericho), Blataria the war princess and even the narrator.
- You Can't Thwart Stage One: Or stage two, for that matter. Stage three of Queen Blattaria's plan is so horrible, we never find out what, exactly, it even is. Fortunately the Planet Smasher puts a stop to it.
