'I Knew Her'

PRIOR to his appearance on Cold Spring, Alex Tiuniaev was known for his ‘Artificial Symphony’ (2005) CD on the Ottersong Records label, a comparatively more obscure release that was brimming with tortured lyrics about emotional and psychological turmoil, cruelty, loneliness, insecurity and ethereal beauty. Tiuniaev, who is from Moscow, attended music school for three years and his aesthetic tastes include Deep Forest, Enigma, Delerium and Enya. He is also rather appreciative of some of Europe’s finest electronic pioneers, among them Jean Michel Jarre, Mike Oldfield, Vangelis and Tangerine Dream. The external artwork that accompanies ‘I Knew Her’ is incredibly stark, with the front and back covers of the CD featuring three layers of horizontal minimalism which together form an unremitting landscape in black, grey and tan. It does possess a sense of liberation, uncluttered freedom and open space, but it’s also very bleak, unwelcoming and inhospitable. The image which is spread across the inside of this four-panel insert, on the other hand, retains the theme of grim desolation but is littered with tall trees, long shadows and a distant lake. Dedicated to ‘those seeking love’, Tiuniaev’s work is comprised of a single 40-minute track and is best experienced in a suitably dark setting without any distractions. Take the phone off the hook, shut the curtains, relax and enjoy the ride as the high-pitched tones and throbbing background wash over you like a dark ambient baptism. Listen carefully and you will detect the sound of a cello grinding away steadily until it becomes the most dominating feature of all. It’s dark and brooding, but almost sensitive at the same time. It toys with the emotions, fills the mind with imagery and encapsulates the senses. Tiuniaev’s musically-trained background is easy to detect and the piece is complex and richly-layered with extravagant features that complement - but never compete with or impede - the overall synchronicity of the sound. You don’t need the title or the dedication to tell you that this is a love song. It’s passionate and tender, gentle and expressive; perhaps one of the most beautiful and sublime pieces of music that you will ever hear. Synthetic swathes of rhythmic air seem to mirror the expansive self-oxygenation of a giant beast, both inhaling and exhaling in time with the music like the gentle rise and fall of a lover’s breast. It’s both comforting and sexual, reassuring and erotic. The symphonic choirs flow through the senses with a dynamic charge of unbridled energy, heightening the awareness but also enabling one to lose oneself entirely. Magnetic and absorbing, the final few minutes of the track gradually lower you back down to the all-too-familiar earthly domain that waits like a base camp at the foot of every summit. ‘I Knew Her’ gives off a vast aura of indescribable joy and Tiuniaev has set to music that rare pinnacle of pure bliss that arrives at the very moment when two people fall in love. For some it is but a fleeting experience, for others it can last a whole lifetime. That cataclysmic meeting of two complimentary individuals, that coming together of the phenomenon which Miguel Serrano described as the Him-Her and the Her-Him. That fusion of destiny. A consolidation of that which was always meant to be. This, at least, is how the music reveals itself to me. And I am being deadly serious when I tell you that this is my favourite album of 2008.

For more information please visit Alex Tiuniaev‘s website at: http://www.alextiuniaev.com/