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The Books
LOST AND SAFE
(Tomlab)
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The Books are Nick Zammuto and Paul de Jong, two North Adams–based musicians who transform the homespun pluckings of various stringed instruments into technical but emotional computer music. On their first two albums — 2002’s Thought for Food and 2003’s The Lemon of Pink — they didn’t give much thought for conventional song structure; their sliced-and-diced guitars, processed cellos, and choreographed vocal samples function mostly as pure sound. Often breathtakingly beautiful sound, however: each disc has a few passages where the gentle collision of those elements evokes the random order of nature in a way electronic music rarely does. Boasting a greater vocal presence from Zammuto, Lost and Safe leans toward the experimental indie rock of New York’s Animal Collective. Its pleasures take longer to unfold, and at first it sounds a little underdeveloped — what we’re not in need of right now is one more indie guy mumbling politely over picked acoustic-guitar arpeggios. Yet stay with a track like "Be Good to Them Always," in which quiet vocal near-verses alternate with not-quite-choruses whose clipped, whirring guitars recall the work of Steve Reich, and Lost and Safe’s modest magic will reveal itself. (The Books perform this Friday, April 29, at the Museum of Fine Arts, 465 Huntington Avenue in Boston; call 617-369-3306.)
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