Nino Carlos & Friends – Placenta

There are ghosts of California hippies in Carlos Nino’s musical universe. The Placenta album cover reinforces this feeling, with its contrasting colors. A California, however, closer to that of Frank Zappa and Terry Riley rather than Grateful Dead or Crosby Stills and Nash.

An album in which we hear babies crying, which seems to have been made by an alternative community of musicians, perhaps under the influence of some psychedelic stuff. Or not.

Carlos Nino is a free musician, improviser and explorer of all kinds of sounds. A psychedelic, hairy jazzy. He’s also a DJ, producer, radio host, arranger and more. He recently coproduced the first solo album by André 3000, the rapper turned flautist and producer. He also collaborates with a host of musicians.

Placenta is the eighth volume in the odyssey of Carlos Nino and Friends. In thirteen tracks and one hour and seventeen minutes, we embark on a surprising journey, punctuated by unexpected turns, where dissonant improvisation rubs shoulders with gentle melodies. We hear percussion, horn, accordion, organ, synthetic guitar, flute, saxophone, keyboards, multiple sound collages and a few voices.

Here we understand the importance of Carlos Nino’s friends, who contribute fully to this impression of a communal jam session: Sam Mendel, Nate Mercereau, Jamire William, Haize Hawk, André 3000, etc.

Placenta is intended as a celebration of birth. Listening to the music, it’s easy to imagine people dancing, painting, meditating and breastfeeding in a kind of neo-Woodstock.  And

yet, despite the hippie ghosts I conjure up, Carlos Nino & Friends’ music is resolutely current. And exciting.