EL TRIO DE OMAR RODRIGUEZ LOPEZ - CIENCIA DE LOS INUTILES

I have all The Mars Volta albums and some Omar Rodriguez Lopez works as well. Because I think the band itself is one of most interesting progressive acts form last decade.

Omar solo albums are a bit different story, but some of them are quite similar to TMV music. Another are more different, with some trips to different genres. But almost often they are interesting, especially if you're TMV fan.

This fresh album is most unusual Omar solo work I ever heard. Yes, it is "El Trio" work, not Omar solo album. And you will easily will fill the difference. Ximena Sariñana is Mexican singer (and Omar girlfriend), she participated in some Omar previous solo albums, and I liked her voice and the music was played there.

On his album she is a singer. Omar Rodriguez-Lopez plays acoustic guitar. Aaron Cruz plays bass. All three of them are "El Trio de Omar Rodriguez-Lopez". The music is minimalistic simple acoustic ballades with slight Latin scent. It's all.

Ximena Sariñana's voice is pleasant, but has no big possibilities to show its abilities. Omar plays so simple guitar music you can hardly hear street musicians play in your town. Melodies are all pleasant, but not too different. No drums or even percussion presented. Happily, there is some warm and slightly sad atmosphere in all album. It's all!

Possibly, the best name for this music is amateurish folk, but it depends on point of view. With respect to Omar's figure ,this music could be named minimalistic avant-garde as well.

No traces of heavy prog, any form of guitar rock as well. For Omar heavy fans only.

And right after seeing ORL fine tune a particular aesthetic to a much more well-realised and iterated upon state than usual, we immediately get thrown directly back into another huge shift in style, though in this case it's likely that it comes down to the fact that he didn't play as big a role in writing as usual. This feels much closer to a Ximena Sariñana with Omar providing an additional bit of his own spin on things, rather than the inverse that was occurring in the past. That said, despite the fact that a collection of subdued folk songs are a far cry from anything else he'd crafted up to this point, it's not really a bad thing either, with a lot of these songs at the very least having a very strong sense of melody that does a lot even with a very minimalistic sound. I also think it's further heightened by those moments where you can really sense that he's putting that bit more of a spin on things, with these ethereal, acoustic songs slowly descending into more psychedelic, intense territory without ever fully compromising its aesthetic, making it contribute to a surreal atmosphere as opposed to simply distracting from what's trying to be achieved. It can be a bit overly repetitive and unchanging at certain points, but even so, this is another pretty neat album that's 100% worth a listen at least once.