Exit Soma
Just Flew By
CD. 2024. Progressive Rock.

Take a teacher in his mid-fifties (Markus Lackmann) with a passion for prog rock and a former student (Lajosch Schrot) who shares the passion and the result is a progressive concept album. Markus & Lajosch worked on their dream for over a year, which was finally released in 2024. I'm reviewing the CD version here, because I'm old school.

First of all, the technical side. The CD sounds clean, the music doesn't sound dull or too leveled, there's nothing to criticize there. In addition to Markus and Lajosch, ten other musicians took part. Singing is always a matter of taste, but I think every singer on this CD is good. The booklet is well designed, the images are AI generated. We'll have to get used to that. Likewise, the fact that the facts about the earth come from ChatGPT and are spoken by the text-to-speech generator Narakeet. I think music should always be made by people, but I also see the effectiveness of AI and how it can help small bands with small budgets. Exit Soma is open about it and I think that's right. But we shouldn't have any illusions, the profit-oriented music industry will use AI to produce music even more cheaply. So support the "small" bands so that they can make good music as independently as possible.

Aliens find a planet called Earth, in a completely out-of-date spiral arm of the Milky Way. The AI ​​on board tells them what makes the Earth so special. However, a few conversations are enough for the visitors to realize that humans are a hopeless case. In any case, the visitors leave empty-handed and do not help. Beneath this perhaps not new idea lies a socially critical concept album about the state of our planet. As with many other good prog albums, it all starts with an overture. “This Strange Blue Planet”. With the spoken facts about our Earth, it reminds me a little of the song The Search For Terrestrial Life by Phideaux. Although Exit Soma deliver a clear prog song here. With fiddly elements, varied passages. “Just Flew By” starts off like a gentle Porcupine Tree song and then transitions into Dream Theater. In “H+” I hear a melodic song where the lyrics and music flow beautifully into one another. With pop elements. A first highlight for me. "Broken Beyond Repair" reminds me vocally and musically of the US band Refestramus, on their album Intourist. And I like this style. Nice and rocky. "Backhanded Guide To Success" comes with some samples of today's despots, Trump, Putin, Erdogan, Xi, etc. If I were an alien, I would run and fast!
"Fuck Yeah!" describes the state of many people pretty well. Musically, it's not really my thing. "Never Enough" is another highlight for me, a beautifully flowing song. "The Lot Of Them" reminds me of Ayreon, rocky notes, good vocals, spacey keyboards. "Cosmic Joke" is a good prog song, with a spacey note. For me, the best song on "Just Flew By". The closer "(Not) All is Lost" also has an Ayreon note for me and compensates us at the end with a little hope.

I had trouble coming to a conclusion and categorizing this CD at first, as is usually the case with albums that don't immediately catch my ear. It was only during the more intensive review phase, when the album was played over and over again, I looked at the lyrics and read the booklet, that the music slowly sank into my brain. Exit Soma delivers a kind of reminiscence of prog rock. The story is current and is conveyed well by the lyrics and music. Technically there is nothing to complain about. I take my hat off to producing such a good, complete concept album in a professional manner. I hope Exit Soma gives us more concept albums. If you would like a CD by Exit Soma, please contact Markus Lackmann.

The photos are all from my CD. The rights to all motifs, logos, texts and fonts that can be seen in the photos are of course owned by the copyright holder.