Xenophanes

This was Omar’s first album to feature Ximena Sariñana as a vocalist.  It was also the first album to feature Omar in a significant singing role.  Thomas Pridgen has been quoted as believing Xenophanes was going to be a The Mars Volta album during the recording process.  This may be accurate considering the higher quality recording of Xenophanes compared to Omar’s other solo albums.  

In the liner notes, Omar wrote:

“This album is dedicated to and exists in celebration of Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Ximena Sariñana Rivera who have always believed in me and pushed me to be my true self. Thank you.”

The majority of the album appears in a significantly different form as Ensayo de un Desaparecido.

Per a Myspace posting, Xenophanes is about:

“A conceptual journey through life, death, and rebirth, the album tells the story of a selfish and judgmental female caseworker who falls in love with a male client, only for him to die soon thereafter. Over the course of eleven subsequent lifetimes, the woman experiences life from every conceivable vantage point as her soul evolves, thereby allowing the maturity and eventual letting-go of her ego which in turn enables the realization that the man was, and always has been, her father spirit. Suggesting the fractal and holographic nature of both consciousness and physical reality, the concepts embraced on Xenophanes will appear at least vaguely familiar to anyone with experience in the psychedelic and/or shamanic realms, concepts which Xenophanes himself was likely the first to express within the confines of Western philosophy.”

:The more aggressive (and more successful) version of a set of songs. The quieter twin album was released nine years later.” – Clouds Hill