In the sprawling undergrowth of experimental sound art, Giovanni Lami, Hannibal Chew II (aka Gonçalo F Cardoso), and Bardo Todol (aka Pablo Picco) take us deep into the heart of an Amazon that has perhaps never existed, yet feels strangely real. "Stories del Tiburón Llorón del Amazonas", the sequel to their earlier collaboration "Stories of the Indian Dotted Whale", invites us to commune with an imaginary crying shark whose wails, they insist, echo through the rivers of the rainforest. Whether you believe in this lachrymose predator or not, the resulting three-part release is as enigmatic, humid, and haunting as the myth it embodies.

The album’s three contributors are no strangers to field recordings, but their approach here isn’t about documentary fidelity. Instead, this is a kind of speculative ethnography: a sonic portrait of a place that exists in the gaps between memory, imagination, and sonic manipulation. Each artist's contribution forms a distinct act in this surreal, acoustic theater of the absurd.

Giovanni Lami opens the journey with "A la Noche / A la Selva / En la Sombra" and "A la Lluvia", compositions woven from ghost recordings captured during the shooting of "Tras el Barco de Fitzcarraldo" in Iquitos, Peru. Lami’s textures drip with the spectral. The layers of insect drones, muffled chatter, and fleeting echoes seem less like sounds and more like hauntings - fleeting imprints of a rainforest that remembers everything. It’s musique concrète soaked in rain and regret, reminiscent of artists like Chris Watson but tinged with an eerie detachment.

Hannibal Chew II shifts gears with two sprawling tracks: "La Guagua Transamazónica" and "Dos Leyendas de una Fauna Perdida". His work feels more tactile, a jumbled yet deliberate reconstruction of Amazonian fragments assembled in the Canary Islands during a sweltering summer. Chew’s methods evoke the anarchic spirit of the Fluxus movement, where field recordings, jam sessions, and raw improvisation collide into something oddly cohesive. Radios hum like trapped cicadas, motorboats grind into static, and disembodied voices float like lost spirits through the mix. It's disorienting, like stepping off a canoe into a kaleidoscopic fever dream where reality bends under the weight of the Amazon’s mythic density.

Bardo Todol’s contribution plunges us into the depths with a visceral, abrasive take on the Amazonian soundscape. Recorded alongside Lami during the same film shoot, his manipulation of tape and digital recordings on "Radios Húmedas" and "Mercados de Insectos Vibrantes" is raw and confrontational. This is no idyllic river cruise; it’s a chaotic, buzzing maelstrom where markets erupt into cacophonies of insectoid rhythms and radios bleed static like ruptured veins. Todol’s sound feels like a love letter to the chaotic beauty of the Amazon, full of glitches, distortions, and uncanny juxtapositions that recall the work of Francisco López or even the harsh textures of Prurient.

And what of the titular "Tiburón Llorón"? Its cries - claimed to be interwoven into the recordings - are never overt, but the concept permeates the album like a lingering fog. Whether the shark is real, imagined, or a metaphor doesn’t matter; its melancholia infuses every moment. The artists seem to suggest that the shark’s sobs are no different from the static of a radio or the drone of insects. It’s all part of the same vibrant, interconnected ecosystem of sound, myth, and memory.

Despite its conceptual weight, "Stories del Tiburón Llorón del Amazonas" isn’t without humor. There’s something delightfully absurd about dedicating an entire triple album to the sobbing of an imaginary shark. The album’s title alone hints at the playful irreverence at its core, as if the artists themselves are winking at the listener through the sonic murk. But beneath the humor lies a deep respect for the act of listening and the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of the sounds around us.

Ultimately, "Stories del Tiburón Llorón del Amazonas" is a testament to the power of collaboration and imagination. Lami, Chew, and Todol have created a work that defies easy categorization. It’s not just ambient, nor is it strictly field recording or noise. Instead, it occupies a liminal space where genres dissolve, leaving only the raw, visceral experience of sound.