Merzbow

Big tip!  Originally released in 1986 by RRRecords as a reworked double LP, Batztoutai with Memorial Gadgets remains one of the most enigmatic and layered documents in Merzbow’s vast discography. Now presented in its most complete form to date, this stunning 3LP edition by Kontakt Audio restores the original 1985 recordings in full, remastered from tape and accompanied by a previously unreleased session from the same era. Recorded at ZSF Produkt Studio in Tokyo, Batztoutai marks a pivotal moment in Masami Akita’s early evolution—bridging his cut-up industrial origins with the dense, obsessive textures that would define Japanese noise. Field recordings, musique concrète gestures, and fragments from François Bayle, Conlon Nancarrow, and Luc Ferrari are woven into a sonic fabric that is as subversive as it is cerebral.

The album’s cryptic title draws from “Battōtai”, a historical military march, and its original artwork—collaged with imperial Japanese symbols—offers a veiled critique of national identity, militarism, and memory. Tracks like “Anus Anvil Anxiety” and “Mortegage” plunge into disorienting realms where raw sonic matter becomes political reflection, dislocated ritual, and physical intensity. More than just a reissue, this definitive edition offers rare insight into Merzbow’s formative years and the unstable ground from which Japanoise emerged. A towering document of industrial abstraction and sonic radicalism, finally given the treatment it has always deserved.

Drew Daniel (Matmos) In a 2003 article, Drew Daniel included Batztoutai with Memorial Gadgets among the top musique concrète albums, stating:

"What Coldcut's Journey by DJs set is to the hip-hop mixtape, this baby is to musique concrète: a double exposure of elaborately détourned and fricasseed material which was already quite tricked out in the first place."