The Floor's Too Far Away

Features

Description

Although Ozric Tentacles is the bridge between 1970s space rock and 1990s techno, they've never quite crossed that bridge themselves. They remain suspended in an approach that sounds like it could've come straight out of the recording sessions for Gong's You and Steve Hillage's Fish Rising albums from the mid 1970s, a decade before they were formed.

With Ozric, you strap yourself in and hold tight as the band careens through sequencer patterns spinning like rotor blades, slicing up the real fusion drum grooves that remain the engine of their sound. As kinetic as techno, but full of syncopated rhythms that shift through complicated time signatures, Ozric layer synthesizer swirls, deep-throb bass lines, and serrated guitar forays from founding and only original member Ed Wynne.

In fact, Wynne plays a lot of the instruments and programs the entire album. With the departure of flutist Champignon, part of the sonic palette is missing, but Wynne and his wife, keyboardist Brandi, make up for it in electronic colors. Much of Ozric's music is about morphing forms, as stuttering voices evolve into a gurgling lead synth line that's chased by a guitar that morphs into an explosion. The Floor's Too Far Away breaks no new ground for the psychedelic travelers, but it is more tightly arranged and a cogent distillation of a sound that's been fermenting for 23 years.

The tea is definitively steeped. Have a cuppa. --John Diliberto