No one makes music quite like The Books, and that’s a statement that, much like their music, operates on multiple levels simultaneously. It’s doubtful anyone is writing, recording and performing songs via the same process as current New Yorkers Nick Zammuto and Paul de Jong who combine prodigious acoustic and electrical instrumentation with amusingly odd found sounds and vocal samples into surprising and entertaining rhythmic juxtapositions, musical narratives and sonic concoctions. But as doubtful as it may be that anyone works a similar process as The Books, even if someone does, it’s a certainty that the end results are nothing like what The Books wind up with. There is quite simply no appropriate card catalog in which they can be filed, and if possible, their unique presence is amplified and expanded on their fourth LP The Way Out.

Often times experimentation makes for uncomfortable listening, but The Books only feel uncomfortable when they choose to be, and quite often they prefer to provide cozy sonic environments instead. The Way Out begins with “Group Autogenics I” which supplies a welcome message via sample from some new agey spoken word meditation guide set into gently percolating acoustic guitar, bass and a few wandering atmospherics. A funk bassline and excited samples intoning “I didn’t know that” greet listeners on the song of the same name, while “A Cold Freezin’ Night” takes the funk even more abstract with a steady kick backing chattering drums, deep bass and a series of sampled children talking about violence before unexpected harmonicas and other accents join the fray. When telling “The Story of Hip Hop” The Books make musical reference to the subject in the song title while finding an amazing sample of an oddly apt children’s story that could almost be about a rabbit, yet fits the genre perfectly. “All You Need is a Wall”, “We Bought the Flood” and “Free Translator” all both be shoehorned into the freak folk category, but they each go their own way to get there. No two songs on The Way Out sound similar or dissimilar enough to be locked together or completely cast apart and that the strength of this amazingly fun listen. The Books have found their way out of convention, and they’ve been kind enough to invite us all along with them.

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