When the music of The Books arrived, it was precisely this kind of implacable feeling that garnered the album so much praise. It didn’t seem to be connected to any other sounds or styles at the time, and Zammuto credits Mark Richardson’s revelatory 8.4 review at Pitchfork for really kickstarting The Books’ career. Richardson captured what still is so readily wonderful about The Books: There is just so much mystery to discover. Once you drop into the album and get your bearings, there’s the appearance of freak folk, musique concrète, electro-acoustic neo-classical, and cafe indie. But the songs shift in and out of form as if each measure of music was a replica made out of a million grains of sand.