Dis Cover: Perfume - Nebula Romance: Part 2

Perfume finally unveiled the album covers for Nebula Romance: Part 2. And I was flabbergasted by how many fans seemed shocked and surprised that the album cover is stylistically the same as Nebula Romance: Part 1. Like… What were y’all expecting? Of course it was gonna look similar.

HENNYWAY.

As per Nebula Romance: Part 1, we get 3 album covers — a regular edition cover, a limited edition cover and a fanclub cover. And shockingly, the regular edition cover is not my preferred cover. 90% of the time with Japanese releases, the regular edition cover is the best one.

Perfume - Nebula Romance: Part 2 [Regular edition] | Polydor Records / Universal Music

I’m not really feeling this cover. The first time I saw it, I just had this immediate reaction of ‘I don’t really like this’.

I like how this cover is distinctly darker than the cover for Nebula Romance: Part 1. But visually it doesn’t quite pop as much as Part 1’s cover did and it’s not just because it’s darker. Something can still be dark and moody, yet pop visually. I think the cover needed to feature more characters or have something more in the background aside from just Emperor Palpataka. I also think there should have been a representation of sound and music on this cover, as was the case with Part 1. I think this is an important motif which should have carried through into this cover, because even within the story of Nebula Romance, Perfume are pop stars and sound and music was a focus on the Part 1 album cover — Perfume holding microphones, the inclusion of Perft Punk and the giant Death Star of speakers.

Every time I see this album cover, I stare at it for a good minute. As though if I stare at it long enough, I might like it. But the only thing I like about it is that it contrasts with Part 1 — being the darker of the two album covers. It woulda been cool if the music on Nebula Romance: Part 2 was generally darker than Part 1, but that’s a whole other post.

Perfume - Nebula Romance: Part 2 [Limited Edition] | Polydor Records / Universal Music

I am surprised at myself for liking this cover the most, because limited editions often end up with the worst covers and I rarely ever like them.

The cool thing about this cover is that if you place it beneath the limited edition cover for Nebula Romance: Part 1, it forms one image. Not only this is so cool creatively, but it’s really going to add to the collectibility of it for those who bought the limited edition of Nebula Romance: Part 1.

Perfume - Nebula Romance: Part 2 [Fan club edition] | Polydor Records / Universal Music

The fanclub cover is interesting. Whilst visually it’s a deviation from its Part 1 counterpart, creatively it matches it. Just as the fanclub cover for Part 1 was shot on the set of a music video, the same appears to be the case here. But the deviation is that Perfume aren’t in the same outfits they’re wearing on the regular edition of the album cover — where-as for Part 1, Perfume were.

I’m sure the music video will provide context for the additional look. Maybe this is who Perfume were before they became Kikimo’s Angels. Or maybe this is who Perfume becomes after defeating Emperor Palpataka. You can see that a light is being shone on Perfume in the shot, and the colours match those from the regular edition album cover. I don’t know if that will mean anything, but we’ll see soon enough when the music video drops. It’s a nice shot though. Even if it does look a bit too similar for the look and cover for “Flow” and thereby makes this feel more like a single cover, than an album cover. But Perfume wearing two looks for the album covers means that we’ll get shots of Perfume in two looks in the Nebula Romance: Part 2 album inlay, which makes a nice bit of variety — similar to LEVEL3. And it just occurred to me that Nebula Romance: Part 2 and LEVEL3 are the only instances of Perfume wearing 2 different looks for different versions of the album covers.

I really do hope that Perfume releases ‘Nebula Romance Complete’ which features a brand new album cover, a brand new song, new mixes of certain songs and all of the songs from Part 1 and 2 sequenced together. There ain’t no connected story in these songs, so it’s not like shifting them around to make them flow better as one album would fuck up the narritive. And having heard previews of the songs from Part 2, I am pretty underwhelmed and can’t shake the feeling that Nebula Romance should have just been one album instead of two and that releasing a version of Nebula Romance with all of the songs and a few tweaks would better sell Nebula Romance to those who have been lukewarm on it so far. But that’s a whole other post.

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💿 Album reviews: Game | Complete Best | Triangle | LEVEL3 | JPN | Cosmic Explorer | The Best “P Cubed” | Future Pop | Plasma | Nebula Romance: Part 1

🎛️ Extended Mixes: Mawaru Kagami | Moon | Cosmic Treat | Nebula Romance