Burying a known style in clutter may have been an understandably reactionary move to intentionally set Zammuto apart from the Books, but the end result was more confusing than distinctive. Released in 2014, follow-up album Anchor sounds almost immediately like the work of a different entity altogether, or at very least the work of an artist in a very different place than before. Opening track "Good Graces" drifts in gracefully on a bed of ambient synths before truly beginning with a dusty electric piano riff, laid-back dubby grooves, and softly shimmering vocals from Daniela Gesundheit of indie act Snowblink. Compared to the album before this, the song is strikingly minimal and brimming over with cold confidence, where before there were only manic shifts from one extreme sound to the next. Much of Anchor follows this trend, with obtuse funk workouts like "Hegemony" consisting of little more than busy live drums, complex vocal harmonies, and the most skeletal of instrumental arrangements to keep the song glued together. All Music
Tracklist
1. Good Graces
2. Great Equator
3. Hegemony
4. Henry Lee
5. Need Some Sun
6. Don't Be a Tool
7. Electric Ant
8. Io
9. Stop Counting
10. Sinker
11. Your Time
12. Code Breaker