Tomlab
The Books : Lost and Safe (2005)****°
I’ve read in Wire magazine how The Books was seen by them as the best release of last year (see their list here). While I trust this magazine as one of the best and most honest, with the widest scope and perspective, and while I liked already the first release of this group, I felt obliged to check out this next release, and I'm glad I did. The Books style and their recording techniques seems to have matured further.
There are only a few more “simple” songs of which the background sounds and rhythms mostly have a remarkable and original way of evolving with its sound colours, while the songs and vocals mostly bind the vocal samples.
Track “one” (A Little Longing Goes Away) has the simplest solution of making the sounds in the music more intelligent. The ambient-echoing amplified sounds with the guitar and some reverb on the singing create extra space (where such studio technique could have as easily blurred the songs and content, but not here).
The core on “two”’ (Be Good to Them Always) is based upon beautiful electronically or computerised rhytmically processed loops of cello. The spoken word and electronics finish it off with a documentary-like filmic beauty, which include quotes and fragments of thoughts taken out of the context of daily life, and other wordiness compiled from other recordings.
“three” (Vogt Dig for Kloppervok) has some spoken word literature samples, and show fragments of situations, and mixes this with beautiful folktronica, which moves and evolves into space with added effects.
“four” (Smells like Content) is much more a song, with modern sounds of echoing movements of acoustic clicks and found sounds with warm amplified guitar, slightly echoing along with the moving waves of the clicks and sounds.
“Five” (It Never Changes to Stop) is a completely acoustic track with descriptive melodic-moody cello and banjo-like fingerpicking-rhythmic guitars, also with more spoken word and additional cello that becomes filmic.
“Six” (An Animated Description of Mr. Maps) uses rhythmic pulses (performed by a variety of instruments, including banjo and at times more wild percussion, interacting with a radiovoice, and with a song control on top of it.
“Seven” (Venice) has more samples of voices (including Dali,..), compiled to a musical piece, embedded on thumbpiano like rhythms.
“Eight” (None but Shining Hours) is a more “normal” and simple song, well mixed with modern sounds and rhythms, with new mixing techniques showing intelligent evolutions in the colours of the sounds.
“Nine” (If Not Now, Whenever) and a bit less “ten” (An Owl with Knees) are other examples of a sampled collection of sounds and voices, with the clarity of a song and rhythms holding the found elements in an intelligent way together, while the rhythms in its modern mix evolve in its soundcolours.
Last track, “eleven” (Twelve Fold Chain) is an acoustic song with some minor background sounds which participate in the composition.
...An intelligent release which still fits with the name of the band, the Books...
