Matmos was one of the more unlikely left-field experimental electronic acts to appear when their self-titled debut was quietly released on their own Vague Terrain label at the beginning of 1997. Based in San Francisco and completely out of the largely U.K.-dominated electronica loop, the duo (Drew Daniel and Martin C. Schmidt) stood little chance of being heard among the din of marketing budgets and entrenched proppers of popular mainstays such as Warp, Rephlex, and Astralwerks and encroaching big-name acts such as the Chemical Brothers and the Prodigy. Closer in spirit to the American indie underground (a notion buoyed by a flood of early press in fixtures such as Alternative Press, Magnet, and Option), the group was also embraced by hardcores of the Autechre/Aphex/µ-Ziq ilk, leading to a feature in highbrow U.K. avant-garde stalwart The Wire and interest from a number of notable European labels.