Music, just like any other art medium, serves to reflect our environment and to make sense of our place in the world, both philosophically and emotionally. Facing ineluctable scientific-technological progress people tend to quickly adapt their artistic expression to the modern challenges, and their music ― to the fast-changing acoustic surroundings. So nowadays we have a broad variety of instrumental electronic genres to talk not just about our feelings or political statements (although they still maintain their vital importance), but also about our possible future ― ultramodern architecture, cutting-edge technology and space travel. Especially the latter: just imagine that eighty years ago the military have mocked at Jack Parsons’ rocket ambitions, and today we have Elon Musk, who’s preparing the first private Mars colonisation. Isn’t this a good reason to create more electronic music to celebrate our sparkling future in the depths of cold but exciting space?

Well, that excitement is exactly what you get from a new Tineidae album released on Cryo Chamber label. Exo possesses the qualities of the mature ambient release: it’s smart, well-arranged, with beautiful, strict, almost epic harmonies and complex sound textures. Space ambient is all about the atmosphere, and Tineidae does an amazing job at creating both a sense of spaciousness and almost asphyxiating closeness. Still it avoids an unnecessary overelaborating: album’s musical simplicity is stylish and sharp, emphasizing sound design rather than melodic structures, so you won’t even notice this smooth and somehow comforting hour to elapse.

Though the key harmonical concept, namely a classical and reasonably common tonal chord progressions, remains constant throughout the whole release, the overlay details are quite diverse and pointful. The beautiful ascending quintoles in Patterns in the Sky resemble the running led lights on the spaceship’s command console, and Abandoned Mothership presents a haunting repetitive melody, accentuated by atmospheric sweeps and distant communication noises. The middle of the album (tracks 4 to 7) is slightly more aggressive, with dense and metallic soundscapes that reach its majestic zenith in Stars so Bright, My Eyes Hurt and uneasy oldschool figurations of Reconnection. Sky Burial and Star Mist then present the depths and heights of ambient landscapes respectively, the latter juxtaposing cold electronic chords and nuanced texture reminiscent of some worryingly unnatural bird chorus.

Generally Exo stays within the genre and doesn’t try to deconstruct the basics of ambient music, but it clearly matches the listeners’ expectations: it’s an intense and enjoyable musical experience managing to create vivid visual imagery. Hopefully the first Mars colonizers will stumble upon Tineidae’s album compiling their in-flight playlist: our humble terrestrial music surely deserves to rise ad astra to start a new era of space art for all humanity.

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