Revised Edition: Perfume - Plasma

Perfume’s Plasma was a pleasant surprise. The singles were a bit hit and miss. But Perfume and Nakata Yasutaka pulled a LEVEL3 on us—having us wonder how the hell this album would sound based on a string of lacklustre singles, just to hit us with an album where it all held together. But, as is common with Perfume albums, the sequencing was a bit of a shambles. “Time Warp” following “Plasma”? “Spinning World” not being sat alongside “Drive’n the Rain”? “Android&” being the second to last song on the album!?

Fushizen na gurl, please.

Needless to say, me and my fast self re-ordered the songs on Plasma immediately, to make it flow a little better and make it feel more cohesive.

1. Plasma
2. Mawaru Kagami
3. Time Warp
4. Polygon Wave
5. Android&
6. Spinning World
7. Drive’n the Rain
8. Hate na Bito
9. Flow
10. Sayonara Plastic World
11. Saisei

Yes. I took “∞Loop” off the album, because TO ME, it just doesn’t fit. For the Plasma tour, even Perfume said ‘Yeah, we ain’t performing that’ and treated it like an intermission, where I think “∞Loop” does work. Some songs just work better as a tour piece. Same shit with “Fusion” and “Story”. On the albums, they didn’t really work. But as tour / performances pieces, they absolutely did.

I was torn on whether “Sayonara Plastic World” should be the last track. The title makes it an obvious choice. But it doesn’t really feel like the end of an album, where-as I feel “Saisei” does. I had said in my review of Plasma that “Saisei” felt like a bookend to P Cubed and I still feel that way. But when I was shuffling songs around on Plasma and listening to them, “Sayonara Plastic World” just never felt like a true ending to the album, where-as “Saisei” did. It felt far more like a full stop. And I think it’s mainly because of the end of the song—the way it builds and then finishes with this piano. It sounds like a conclusion in a way that “Sayonara Plastic World” doesn’t.

I’ve created this Revised Edition on Spotify and YouTube. The YouTube version features my mix of “Mawaru Kagami” which pulls in the best of both the Perfume Live [Polygon Wave] version and the album version.

🔊 Stream Plasma (Revised Edition): 🟢 Spotify | 🔴 YouTube Music | YouTube

💽 Revised editions of Perfume’s other six albums: Game, Triangle, JPN, LEVEL3, Cosmic Explorer and Future Pop

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🎤 Gig reviews: World Tour 2nd | World Tour 3rd | Reframe | Polygon Wave | Plasma | Code of Perfume

💿 Single reviews: Polygon Wave | Flow | Moon | Sumikko Disco | The Light

💿 Album reviews: Game | Complete Best | Triangle | LEVEL3 | JPN | Cosmic Explorer | The Best “P Cubed” | Future Pop | Plasma