The Books

"All You Need Is a Wall" is S-tier Books for sure. I don't know if I agree with the "puppy dog" evaluation--it's ofc partially true, but it leaves out so much of what makes listening to them compelling. To me, the Books are kind of like the sound of mostly-pleasant dreaming--disjointed, but whole. I actually find the sentimental aspect of their sound less appealing as I age, which I think may be related to my developing allergy for Alan Watts quotes.

I am perennially hoping that Zammuto & de Jong squash their beef and get the band back together. Their solo material is good-to-great (definitely seek out Zammuto's Anchor), but lesser, IMO.

kind of curious what Zammuto has been up to these last 3 years, he went from blogging extensively about every single track The Books did to being offline entirely

you may just possibly detect from my voice that I am Irish...AND NOW I LEAP FORWARD IN TIME.

found a copy of The Way Out at a very reasonable price, played it and was disappointed to hear a bunch of surface noise on Side 3. turns out it exists on the original recording. ahh, the joys of The Books on wax

anyway this record is very good, it's both their most serious/existential and their goofiest at the same time. the concept behind "Free Translator" is so brilliant, I used to love playing around with online translators the same way

Thanks for reviving this thread on all things Books, which I hadn't seen. On The Books - The Lemon of Pink, I posted the following relic, written back when I first heard them:

You're reminding me of the unusual pleasures of these rekkids----here's my preview of their Columbus oh show of long ago (2011):

The Books
Thursday @ Wexner
The Books play (and sample) plucked, strummed and bowed instruments, while talking and singing with countless other sounds, also sampled (and played). Waves of fragments move calmly, and, on their first album, The Lemon of Pink, venerable voices provide “helpful” gibberish. The Books like to ricochet through such decay, although the subsequent Lost & Save risks spelling this out a little too plainly, before zigzagging through unexpected insights and comedy. Their new version of Nick Drake’s “Cello Song,”* even grooves with the glitches of a cheapo CD-R!

*It features Jose Gonzalez and was contributed to the Red Hot charity series comp Dark Was The Night:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvLfcRnCbAo

("cheapo CD-R" was what I downloaded the promo track onto, being behind the tech curve back then and now)

one of my favorite Books moments is I think somewhere on Lost and Safe, at the end of one track a voice comes in and says something like "expectation leads to disappointment, if you never expect anything, you uh...well....ah, whatever, I don't know". such a perfect sample for them

There’s a Song Exploder episode on the song with that sample. It’s Zammuto’s brother, IIRC.

So many good sample clashes with them.

I love one that goes “you may fall and break your leg” followed by “and then one leg of shorter than the other”.

Also it doesn’t make too much sense but “it will rain, it will rain” followed by seagulls doing that sort of tone twice.