(NOTE: BRAND NEW/NON-FACTORY SEALED ITEM!)
(NOTE: LIMITED VINYL EDITION OF 299 COPIES ONLY!)

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"This may be one of his most underrated albums, full stop, because it's one of the most accomplished works in the entire Merzbow discography. It shares a relationship with the albums Oersted and Hybrid Noisebloom, as it was recorded around the same time as those albums. But what makes this better than those albums for me is not just that the textures are amazing, but the timbres that punctuate them really go above and beyond and cause this to be one of the most satisfying listening experiences in his discography. Case in point, the first track, Electricwatersheep, whose first ten minutes would get a perfect rating if it were standalone, and whose opening loop is so beautifully satisfying to listen to that it becomes spiritually cleansing. It's one of the best ways Merzbow has ever opened an album, and everything after this point does not deviate very far from the extremely high bar that the first ten minutes of this track sets. Maybe there are a couple spots where it gets a little directionless, but that's where my gripes with this album end, even if it's enough to prevent it from getting a perfect rating from me. Even in spite of this, the textures are so well assembled that they really manage to hold my attention for the vast majority of its length. Tracks like Tree of Kusukusu keep finding new and inventive ways to stay cathartic over their run times, while still maintaining a base level of loudness throughout. These tracks are busy, too, with multiple different passages of noise collapsing on top of each other at once, and different elements being introduced every few moments to keep things exciting. Only the song Surfactant manages to be a bit quieter than the others, and by then, it's a very welcome change of pace. This isn't the harshest album in his discography, but it's certainly up there, and it takes these harsh, incredibly loud extremes that it grasps and uses it to create a maximally cathartic soundscape that's continually interesting to look inside. When it comes to analog era Merzbow, this manages to sit on top of nearly everything else he's done in that period, not just due to the quality of the textures themselves but the quality of the sound design on display in this release. Whenever I listen to this album, it lights my brain on fire, which is probably the highest praise you can give a harsh noise album. Needless to say, I highly recommend it." Rating: 9/10 - Review by Electricwatersheep.
Tracks on this Double LP are as follows:
| A1 | Electricwatersheep Part 1 | 16:26 |
| B1 | Electricwatersheep Part 2 | 10:12 |
| B2 | Semisolid Mass 1-3 | 10:25 |
| C1 | Tree Of Kusukusu | 17:40 |
| D1 | Surfactant | 19:08 |