Hi there, people.
Before making this EP, I had the idea of making three songs, one is the new mix version of my old song and the rest of two are the new ones. All of which tells a story about my first crush of a female character from the video game that has been forgotten these days. The new EP is called “Nikki”.
The title track of the song “Nikki”, a reference to the main character with the same name, from “Pandemonium”, a series of platform / adventure video games developed by Crystal Dynamics (the same company that brought us games like Gex, Legacy Of Kain and, of course, Tomb Raider) for PS1. The original, released in 1995, was my first PS1 game I’ve played, at the age of 9, thanks to my uncle maternal who recommended it to me. It was so much fun, wacky and pretty good I've never seen anything like it.

The lyrical content of these three songs is much more confident and sincere. Something thoughtful. There’s certainly spirit and charm throughout these songs which are based of my first crush of a video game character I’ve had during my middle childhood. And that is Nikki, the sorceress “supreme”, from Pandemonium 2, released in late 1997. What I like the most about her is her confidence, her maturity and her dignity. Not just her looks. It was a very special surprise, even for me. I remember when some my father’s friend had a copy of that game and recommended it to me after liking the original game, during my Valentine’s Day (my birth date). In 2001, I was 11 when I first played Pandemonium 2 and got me hooked by it. Because it represents my fascination of psychedelic textures / graphics, some of the levels get a bit too harder and darker. In my view, The sequel is even better which it doesn’t get the credit it deserves because I haven’t played this game for a long time. I’ve said it before, I was very impressed by the way Nikki represents on screen and has huge level of charisma and sensuality. She's one of the coolest and toughest characters I've seen in my life.
So, I had to sample some Nikki's quotes (voiced by Deborah Ben-Eliezer). In terms of hype, when it comes to platform / adventure games, Pandemonium! didn't get much recognition as Crash Bandicoot or Spyro The Dragon or even Klonoa. It is one of those games (somewhat forgotten these days) that will remain my memory.

The song ”The Comet Of Infinite Possibilities” is easily the sequel of my old song “Nikki”, from ”The Party’s Over 2” album, which I did the new mix version to release as an EP. Because, in the original version, the volume of guitars, bass and drums needed a little bit more power and energetic. The song was originally written in 2021, the same year that I wrote the song “Nikki”.
The title itself, in the second Pandemonium game, refers to a comet that soared over the fictional land called Lyr, as told by talking marotte Sid, joker’s sidekick as well as secret weapon. Fargus (the joker) and Sid are both Nikki‘s friends.
In the first game, Nikki accidentally casted a spell to destroy the town, so Nikki, Fargus and Sid reach the fictional place called “Wishing Engine” to make a wish the town back to normal.
In the second game, they’re on their journey to destroy the evil empire queen goon as she attempts to capture the Comet.

I wrote the line “I might be gecko but I’m not” after watching the video of complete history of “Pandemonium”, made by Slopes Game Room on YouTube. I didn’t even know that Nikki appeared at the end of Gex 2: Enter The Gecko. Yes, the “gecko” reference is easily a reference to the game Gex. The Crystal Dynamics logo accompanies the gecko Gex with sunglasses.

The last track “You’re Not Alone” is more of a beautiful acoustic ballad than rock n roll. It’s some kind of religious experience when I wrote the lyrics and melodies of this song. And probably the song that I recorded very quickly.
The line “All colours still flying away/Speed greed on screen/The craziest you’ve ever seen” directs at all people who haven’t played yet. Gamer or not, it will blow your mind, it’s definitely worth checking out. Some people like me played Pandemonium and enjoyed it.
The line “I’m the only one who finds you/Very sweet and kind” speaks for itself because most colleagues at the schools that I frequented loathed that game, much less of a characters, Nikki and Fargus. I mean, really detested it for no reason at all. On the other hand, I heard that many people are into Lara Croft from Tomb Raider games, which I also really like, as their crush but I digress. But I’m the minority of those who had such a huge crush on Nikki.

Pandemonium 2 is the game that I love but everybody else seemed to dislike it. And that’s that. That’s the three wishes. Three hearts for all of you, the listeners.

I hope you enjoyed it.

The recordings and productions of the EP were made in Pro Tools software at my house, in Lisbon.

The song “Nikki” was recorded in March to April 2021. Remaining of the songs ("The Comet of Infinite Possibilities" and "You're Not Alone") were recorded from March to April 2023.

All vocals and instruments by Me (Black Cat).
Cover art designed by me.