What if I told you that I acquired exFallen, the latest album from personal love and 100 Days Of subjects Yukueshirezutsurezure, roughly 20 minutes after it officially became available, and then didn’t listen to it until, well, yet, because I waiting for this particular song and MV to come out to subject myself to what was to come? Believe it or not, that’s the boat that I’m in, and I was nervous as all hell when the usual “news at 9:00!” tweet happened and it was clear that the moment had arrived.

Why the nerves? Because I had this overwhelming fear that adding the work of one Chris Fronzak was going to send the song spiraling out of control, overwhelmed by the momentum of lading it with a gimmick outsized even by fans’ wildest dreams. And it also could suck! There are no guarantees in this world, you know? A thing that could be good implies in its very conditional that it could also be bad!

This, though, is very goddamn far from bad:

I’m tremendously sorry, friends, but this is winding up to be maybe my favorite thing ever from NSLE. Maybe my favorite idol thing this year. And it doesn’t even have anything to do with the collaboration (which is minimal)! Four months ago, this was a delicious treat; now, in a world long hungry for something as exquisite in its amalgamation as a Peak Tsurezure song, and in its weird context, and with such a perfectly related MV (right down to the chains) I’m not sure if they or anybody from Codomomental has hit something so completely out of the park. Even considering this, fight me.

Fronz, if you’re reading this, we should talk

It’s enough to make a longstanding fanboy flush inside. And, of course, because the nearest parallel for this song is the delicate dance of brutality and elegance in “Drama with Nietzsche”, I get the same wash of feelings, which is that this could be one of those enviably perfectly suited crossover songs that could drag your cocksure Western metal fans toward idol-related things without breaking a sweat. And that it’s done not in the beat-you-over-the-head way of BBTS, but in the fractured quietude that only NSLE has ever perfected, makes it all the more delicious. Maybe the Fronz attachment helps to lift the song to new audiences; maybe it gets some random airplay outside of Japan and starts to catch on. Regardless, it’s damn near perfect.

As fans, we’re really going to miss Tsuyame; I hope that she at least gets to cheer on her old friends as exFallen turns them into a real-deal thing.