BY STEVEN SAWADA
Cracking the Books
Enlightening the Masses
The Books, P:ano
9:30, Wednesday, 4/19
WOW Hall,
$12 students adv/
$14 public adv/
$15 dos
T UITION ONLY $889
Guaranteed for Spring Sessions only.
Day Classes starting May 1st
11am-4pm Mon-Thur
Weekend Classes - Begin April 22.
11am-4pm Sat & Sun
Flair Workshop - April 25 (All levels)
Creative Cocktail Workshop - April 24
J OB P LACEMENT RATE
OF BETTER THAN 85%
No other school is an actual functioning bar with
the opportunity for live hands on training
We’re right downtown for
pre & post show gatherings
1010 Oak Street
485-4695
Our family centered midwives Continue to provide
women’s health & pregnancy care in Springfield
Births attended exclusively at
Sacred Heart Medical Center
• Many contraception methods available.
• Annual Gynecological Exams
& Hormone Replacement Therapy.
• Childbirth preparation classes open to the public.
Michele K. Bouche, C.N.M. • Angie Zacharek, C.N.M.
1632 J Street, Springfield • 746-8897
Visit our website: mckenziemidwifery.com
Call for a courtesy “Get Acquainted” Visit
THURSDAY:
Weekly Karaoke - Get your Groove On
4/20: E-Spot Party
FRIDAY:
4/14: DJ Dan-OMite
4/21: Gaia Tribe
4/28: DJ Dan-OMite
SATURDAY:
4/15: Lounge Casual w/ Annie & Zo
4/22: Party Like a Genius
Trivia Show w/The Reward System
4/29: Vinyl Pimps & DJ Poe
TUESDAY:
Jam w/ Jason Cowsill - 9pm
B RING Y OUR I NSTRUMENTS
WEDNESDAY:
Audio Schizophrenic • 10pm
LOCAL ARTISTS CONTACT JAXX NOW!
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
McKenzie Midwifery &
Women’s Services, P.C.
“A place where we all get along.”
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
towards found sound, seek out the Internet
radio broadcast that de Jong and Zamutto
did last year for www.dublab.com, which is
now available through Dublab as a podcast.
The hour-long broadcast features favorite
songs and melodies (both from other artists
and The Books catalog) as well as snippets
from The Books’ library of found sound
and field recordings.
What begins with a zealous preacher
trying to sell God morphs haphazardly but
somehow logically into Laurie Anderson’s
“O Superman,” the idiosyncratic scatting of
Shooby Taylor, “Take Time” from The
Lemon of Pink, “Contempt” from Thought
for Food and a slew of obscure found sound
and old timey and international folk music.
All of it in some way contributes to an
understanding of the intention behind the
band’s original albums.
Their live shows now include pre-record-
ed video accompaniment created by The
Books themselves. This new visual element
compiles numerous snippets of found video
culled from thrift stores and field recordings,
much in the same way the duo collects their
sound samples. The overall performance,
visual and aural, should entertain as well as
challenge. If it were simple, and I were lazy,
it’d be nothing more than folktronica. ew
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
I
t’s unfair to pigeonhole The Books with
any of the newly-christened genre
names that seem to bubble up in hip-
ster-friendly music publications on a week-
ly basis. Folktronica, the term most often
used to elucidate The Books’ sound, really
only grazes the surface and belies the com-
plexity behind their music. Wikipedia cites
bands like Boards of Canada, Four Tet and
Mum (bands with sometimes similar but
mostly divergent sounds) as examples of
folktronica musicians.
But unfortunately, it manages to get even
more convoluted than that. According to
Wikipedia, folktronica somehow bleeds into
similar styles like “laptop folk” (which I’ve
never heard of, but I’m sure has probably been
used incessantly on Pitchforkmedia.com),
“beardtronica” (which I believe was con-
trived by a smart-ass Wikipedian to soley
confuse), and “nu-folk” (which also has been
used on Pitchfork and supposedly comprises
the likes of Devendra Banhart!!!). From the
sarcasm, I hope you can sense, folktronica,
The Books really are not. Their music and
their technique are much too intricate and
subtle. Now, what they are…
First, The Books are a duo composed of
Nick Zamutto and Paul de Jong, two found
sound archivists/musicians with a shared
passion for awkward moments caught on
tape, the pure tonality of the human voice
and the obscure scat singer Shooby Taylor.
As a team they combine original cello, gui-
tar and altered vocal work with samples of
pre-recorded human conversation, pre-
speech and idioglossia-like vocalization,
advertisements and dialogue from film.
With these found sound samples sometimes
taking center stage in a song, as they are
repeated, stretched, stuttered and altered in
numerous other ways, they sometimes dic-
tate rhythm and subsequently extend a song
beyond traditional structure.
Recontexualized rather than mutilated,
these samples take on lives of their own,
reaching for new messages and sound apart
from their original environment. But
through their original instrumentation, The
Books still operate within some familiar
framework of melody. Over the course of
three albums (Thought for Food, The
Lemon of Pink and Lost and Safe), they
have gained a significant cult following.
For rare insight into their attitudes
APRIL 13, 2006 29