The MO in a nutshell? "BlackGround pairs real-time voltages in the sound system with the ground potential to in effect generate a continuous lower impedance path for the cosmic ionic particle influx to follow. Any electrical discharge always chooses the path of least resistance. That's what BlackGround represents because it is always at the exact same voltage as the signal. Thus atmospheric noise is dealt with before it interferes with the music signal we want to protect. Because the path follows the signal voltages in real time, we could in fact say that to this cosmic noise the music signal itself becomes the conductor instead of succumbing to being modulated by it. Why more and more BlackGrounds are effective is that each additional unit further lowers this impedance path for less and less intermodulation with the signal." To this techno country bumpkin, the BlackGround action reads a bit like a lightning rod for constant atmospheric disturbances? Engineers will have far more sophisticated insights into the workings of this device. I'll stick to letting my ears be the judge. You might enjoy following these Wikipedia crumbs? Whilst waiting for the overland bus from Lithuania to arrive with my package, I followed my own crumbs – excerpts of early adopter feedback.

Here's what Sven Boenicke said about the BlackGround: "Added eight pairs to the mains. What shall I say? This is a psychedelic experience of dramatic magnitude. The incredible thing about its effect is that it does exactly what my ComDev and newest gen. resonators we use do but even stronger of course. It's that energy shift away from the glare and garbage especially in the top end into the organic, colorful and beautiful; the brown, red, orange and golden colors. That's what I so love. Plus it does something on the reach-out and communication level which is magic. Count me in to get many more of them. This has to go into my own products." User Jens had this: "I was very skeptical when I first heard about this new 'device'. But then I have been skeptical of everything I ever got from LessLoss; before I put it into my system. Even so, the BlackGround seemed somewhat more mystical than the cables, Firewalls and Bindbreakers I already deploy. These are my initial impressions from my brief listening session with one BlackGround on live and another on neutral on the AC: my system seemed to play louder (no settings whatsoever were changed); reverb improved both room-wise and on instruments/voices; recorded ambience improved; layering and detailing improved. Once again Louis put all my doubts to shame." Poul installed four modules in his DIY power distributor. "Immediate and huge improvement in detail, resolution, ambience and dynamics. I recently invested in many upgrades for my system and none made this huge of an improvement but all were much more expensive."

Louis asked how long a power cord I wanted. I requested a meter. I had three places for it, an empty socket in a Vibex Granada/Alhambra AC/DC filter on the main system's source stack; in a passive pre-NCF Furutech distributor on the main system's amp stack; and in a passive NCF Furutech distributor on the DAC, pre, active xover and power combo of the upstairs system. For reset scenarios, I thought of storing the BlackGround in our car to move it outside the house for 24-hour cooling-off interludes. I hoped that contrast against without or at least less of the effect would help get a handle on the delta of whatever difference I might hear. Having experienced prior LessLess kit, I rather doubted that they'd suddenly issued an oops to do nothing. "Sometimes I park my car with 60-120 BlackGrounds some 20-30 meters from the building where my apartment is on the 5th floor. Then the audio from my laptop in the apartment becomes clearly better." So much for me eliminating the effect on a private driveaway parking at best some six meters from the door? It's good then that when the man in brown rang the bell, I was in the midst of a listening session. That was my virgin status quo. If the propaganda was true, anything thereafter would be more or less affected.

The BlackGround DIY module is available individually for $446/ea.

But first, the BlackGround box was unexpectedly heavy. There's more in those mystery modules than hot air. Next came the new C-Marc Prime. At about 1/3rd the physical presence of the classic braided LessLoss power cord, it felt like a very cute garter snake not wrist-thick rattler. Given the BlackGround's footprint, it suggested an ideal support base for my half-width Sonnet Pasithea DAC. So that's where the wooden brick went; atop four footers of the Artesanía rack, converter piggy-backed atop it. By the looks of that, casual observers would assume a Panzerholz isolation platform; not a bad error for one's audiophile cred. I was all set to get my black grounded; or ground blackened?