Aquariusssssss

Album review

As a figure at the center of a fertile underground network of adventurous artists in L.A., producer/DJ/musician Carlos Niño could certainly be described as a man with many friends. So it seems only natural for him to bring a batch of them along for a Carlos Niño & Friends outing like Aquariusssssss (no, there's no knowing why it's spelled like that). Between artists he's produced, collaborated with, or simply befriended at some point, Niño has a wide field of friends to draw on for the collaborations on this album, and he puts that to his advantage, bringing a stylistically diverse array of musicians together to make something that seems like it could be the work of a single entity.
At its core, this could be tagged an ambient album, but it's intriguing to consider the variety of methods through which that ambience is derived. One moment Niño is ushering in the organic, acoustic-based sounds of his improv/free-jazz collective Build an Ark ("Bath of Breath Crystal Crescendo") to create a tweeting, creaking, sighing world of gentle, natural sounds. Then he turns around and brings in renowned indie-tronic artist Dntel of Postal Service fame for the swooping, spacey journey of the appropriately titled "Shapeshift of Uranus." Snatches of spoken word pop up to add interstitial elements over the course of the album as well. From earthy, almost new agey sounds to high-tech electronics, Niño takes an open-ended approach to the sonic palette he employs here, but the end results are that of classic ambient music -- soft, subtle, meditative, and ultimately transformative.

© J. Allen /TiVo