Anecdata, noun: “information or evidence that is based on personal experience or observation rather than systematic research or analysis”. Anecdata’s fifth album ‘If I Was PM’ is a synth-rock concept album centred around a robot politician, where the Tāmaki Makaurau-based artist shifts the irony of his moniker to critique the political landscape of indifference and cruelty.

Such robot politicians would govern based on methodical study over empathy, and the album willfully clashes the two concepts in its synth-heavy droning and fuzzy guitar.

Anecdata’s Dan Satherley has remained restlessly creative, churning out his fifth album in a matter of years. This June 2023 release is around half an hour of new-wave indie grunge, mixed and mastered by the one-man operation in his West Auckland home studio. The pressing themes of standout songs are expertly fortified by the hazy yet tight production in which Anecdata’s dystopia breathes.

Need A Million Dollars is a memorable, head-bopping track about the pursuit of fame despite the financial struggle of the masses, while We’ve All Got Déjà Vu and True channel a slight ’80s feel.

The fitfully overdriven guitars and rock drums of Big Oil mark an imposing presence that looms ever relevant, as similar to Trickle-Up’s challenge of supposedly beneficial socioeconomic models. I’m A Landlord incites a glorious rage upon the higher powers that gleefully garner not so much guilt as green dollar bills.

Anecdata’s at-times simple but tunefully pointed lyrics might have been sung more melodiously, though perhaps this suits his robotic concept, and is made up for in the zappy instrumentation. Really the album’s strength lies in his ability to voice other characters in his conversational lyrics while energetically weaving in synthy punches that would easily rile up any human being.