EPSILON IN MALAYSIAN PALE

Edgar Froese must have had so much energy and so many ideas back in the 1970s; it's astonishing to think of the amount of material he released between his main project with TANGERINE DREAM and the side project of his solo releases: 12 TD releases and five solo just in the 1970s!

Side One: "Epsilon in Malaysian Pale" (16:28) Before getting experimental in the seventh minute, the opening "flute" and Mellotron dominated section is quite developed, sculpted, giving the listener quite a bucolic feeling as Froese must have been feeling being inspired by his recent travels within Oceania. The second section begins around the nine minute mark while treated train sounds form the transitional sound bridge. A simple slow, low sequence and string synth are now accompanying, nearly dominating the "flute" and 'tron sounds that have been carried forward from the opening section. This sounds more like TD but still simpler, somehow more connected to nature. At 13:30 we have traveled to the final section. Gone is the sequencer, gone is the 'tron; now we have strings synth chords and the ubiquitous synthesized "flute." These take us to a peaceful, though heavier, less upbeat, less carefree, end. (9/10)

Side Two: "Marouba Bay" (16:57) opens with a decidedly more-distressed feeling. As the song progresses we hear a lot of sounds familiar to us from the previous TD release, "Phaedra," still in their less than polished sound forms. (You can tell that something happened to EF and TD between the making of this album and the making of "Rubycon" which resulted in much clearer, more confident-sounding sound reproduction. I don't know if it was in the engineering room or equipment or some filtering or sound-board system up-date, but the "old" sound of 74-75 is much more noticeable when compared to Rubycon and beyond. In the sixth minute a arpeggio sequence enters while "horn" and "string" synths alternate their contributions providing melody and interest points. This song feels far more like a Tangerine Dream song, the sound a little more thinly suffused, and more pastoral in its "imagery," but very little to distinguish it from the stuff Froese was doing with TD. (When does he start to use guitar?) (8.5/10)

Not on the level as some of the albums he was doing with/as Tangerine Dream, but close. A four to 4.5 star album.