Vylet Pony's Monarch of Monsters is a large, difficult piece of pony music from the Portland artist, released as a paid title on 15 November 2024. Vylet Pony handles the vocals, instruments, production, mixing and mastering, and the music pulls together electronic pop, R&B, rock, no wave and noise rock, with post-punk, post-grunge and progressive rock also in the mix. The result sounds deliberately hard to pin down, moving between pop immediacy and harsher, more abrasive edges rather than settling into one lane.
Its story follows Vylet Cypress, a tavern bard who becomes the murderous figure called Wolf, then dies and wakes in an afterlife ruled by Aria, a divine Lamb who turns her into a hunting dog. The songs deal in regret, trauma, guilt and the effort to find some form of self-love without excusing the damage done along the way. The lyrics and artwork contain severe material, including sexual violence, self-harm, suicide, murder and gore, so this is firmly aimed at adults who can handle heavy subject matter. The accompanying booklet includes a novella that fills in the narrative, while two vinyl LPs are available for anyone drawn to ambitious, story-led records with rougher rock instincts.
