no world is Andrew and Daniel Aged's second release as inc. (formerly Teen Inc.), and it refines and improves on 2011's 3 EP. On that brief release, the two L.A. producers were still trying to extract their strengths as songwriters and producers from their fixation on 1980s R&B. Two years later, they've found a much more appealing comfort zone. The Ageds are producers and session players first-- they've produced and played with a handful of big names in R&B, soul, and pop music as well as lo-fi artist Nite Jewel-- and this approach manifests itself clearly on no world, which feels like the work of studio hermits successfully dialing in on a sound. The atmospheres, textures, and melodies here feel drawn from a parallel universe where smooth Quiet Storm standards like "All This Love" or "Secret Lovers" were made in the ProTools era of infinite layering.
Whether by plan, luck, or a combination of both, no world finds itself in good company. Over the past 12 months, sultry, slow jam R&B has made an incredible comeback: Miguel's "Adorn" borrowed from "Sexual Healing" and Gregory Abbott's "Shake You Down", and the sound found its cachet heightened with Frank Ocean's "Thinkin' Bout You", Usher's "Climax," Jessie Ware's Devotion, and the Voodoo reissue. inc. doesn't aim to duplicate the vocal abilities or striking personalities of their most skilled contemporaries, instead opting for distinct scene-setting. Opening cuts "The Place" and "Black Wings" are enveloping soundscapes cloaked in velvet, cut with a self-conscious air of mystery. When Andrew sings, "I feel like you've been here before," it's the perfect piece of bedroom soul scene-setting: It's all about you, not him, wait... doesn't he know you from somewhere?
Though the album is obsessed with the sound of the early 1980s, the Ageds incorporate nods toward R&B's internet-fueled 21st century mutations; "The Place" and "5 Days" pull the flat, skittering drum patter from Atlanta's trap-rap production playbook. The last few years' indie/R&B crossover resonates throughout the album, as well, with good reason. Legendary British independent 4AD is releasing no world, and the grey, slowly billowing guitars on "black wings" and the cavernous atmospherics of "Angel" feel like the Aged brothers' nod toward label godheads the Cocteau Twins and This Mortal Coil. Andrew's muted vocals throughout the record, mixed to blend in with the production, have more in common with Toro y Moi's willowy retro soul than anything currently climbing the R&B charts.
Being perfectly of its time obviously doesn't mean that no world competes on the same level as their most successful contemporaries: the xx, Rhye's viral-era, gender-twisting Sade fixation, even How to Dress Well's full-on smooth-soul deconstruction. There's the sense that the duo with the purposefully generic corporate moniker, the timid fixation on lower case letters, and the penchant for composing songs out of genres are comfortable with their whispery anonymity, which is fortunate: inc. is both faithful to its source material and clever enough to twist it into new shapes, but at least for the time being, no world is unlikely to bring the Ageds out of the shadows.
