The first thing you notice with this album, before you even put the disc in the player, is the packaging. As with other Oxidation discs, this one has some involved packaging. In this case, the CD case is glued to a wooden tile with a photo print and the opposite side has dried moss stuck to the wood. Nice. So on to the music itself. The label describes Internal Fusion as “one of the pioneering dark ambient artists with releases on Staalplaat, Désaccord Majeur, Kokeshidisk, and ta'lem.” Indeed, this French artist has put out some interesting work in the past, so I had high hopes for this one.

This disc consists of one 53 minute track, but you really can't think of it as one track. It is better to think of it as a series of interconnected compositions and there is a lot going on in this album. We begin with some stuttering spoken word that's heavily processed. Over time, there ends up being some noise built into it and someone bowing on a cello and rattling metal and chains. Before you know it, things have become quite noisy. This composition shifts gears constantly. At one point you're in noise and then the next thing you know you have synth lines similar to old Mortiis, which also then dissolves into noise. Slow plodding drum beats mixed with bits of piano tinkling and hissing noise. Everything is grist for the creative mill.

As I listened to this, I was reminded of a play I saw many years ago called La Ronde. The premise of the play is that the characters in it behave as if they're in a round dance. The play begins with two lovers. As one leaves, the story follows the one who leaves to meet up with a different lover. The next scene follows the second lover to a third lover and so on until the last lover is with the first one. This album seems to follow a similar trajectory and that's one of the things that I love about this album. Bits and pieces from the previous segment merge into a second segment which then follows through with a third and so on down the line until at the end we're back to - you guessed it - the distorted voices of the beginning. This is a wonderful album because it manages to keep things changing constantly while maintaining a sense of continuity.

Overall, this is incredibly well-crafted experimental and highly recommended. Get a copy while it is available. The moss edition is limited to 50 copies and the no moss edition is also limited to 50. This album weighs in at 53 minutes.