The Books

What new subspecies of wankery is this? Guitar and cello contextualized to sound like laptop doodling? Spoken-word samples so unlikely they might be written and performed rather than researched and found? Plus many minutes of actual singing, or sing-talking, who knows what exactly, about what who knows exactly? If these were actual songs I'd scoff at their inaudible indecisiveness: listen hard now, "Our heads approach a density reminiscent of the infinite connectivity of the center of the sun" in under five seconds. But though this may be pretension, it's also delight, strange and humorous verbally and aurally. It's not catchy, right. Merely memorable and enchanting in the manner of Another Green World--which stays well within the lines by comparison. (Grade: A-)