Back in the early 90s, I was quite the Ozric Tentacles fanatic. It seemed they could do no wrong. When I first heard about Eat Static, I was intrigued, but given they were described more or less as a "techno" band, I steered clear. Money wasn't plentiful and needed to be allocated carefully. In 1997, a fellow collector sold to me a good number of his CDs for pennies on the dollar. Among them included Epsylon, this version being the 1995 Mammoth release that also included their 1993 EP Lost in Time.
Also in 1997, I got hitched. Me being the wise old veteran at 32, she a wide-eyed 23. Of course we dated for over a year, but there's still so much to learn about each other as all married couples understand. On one particularly memorable road trip, I pushed Epsylon into the CD player and off we went. Oh and about 15 minutes later, my beautiful young bride (still is, turns out) is having the time of her life. Dancing in the chair, banging her head, woo-hooing. Apparently... I said to myself ...I should stock up on more of this kind of music. Odd, she didn't act that way when I played Guru Guru's UFO... Yea.
The interesting thing about Eat Static is there's no mistaking their Ozric roots. Take away the analog instrumentation and add synthetic beats, and you have Eat Static. The music isn't dull even for sit down listening. It twists and turns regularly. For my tastes music like this has a natural ceiling of about a 3.5 (Gnosis 10) with a couple of outliers. Epsylon/Lost in Time hits up against that. If for whatever reason you haven't heard much music like this, then Epsylon is as good a place to start as any. Note above story.
As for today, some 22 years later, does said wife have much interest in Eat Static? Oh hell no. However all of our nieces and nephews are very much into what is more broadly known as EDM. They're dancing their brains out. Good for them. Though... still no takers for Guru Guru. Huh? I wonder why...
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