Kelley Hecker loves the packaging for She & Him's Volume Two

By Venus Zine Staff
Published: April 6th, 2010 | 7:00am

Kate Quinby's cover art for She & Him's Volume Two (Merge) is cute, but when I opened the digipack up, I'm pretty sure I squealed. The lyrics booklet is tucked in a little pocket, the tracks "stamped" and listed on the front page. It's like the cards they [used to?] put in library books! How cool is that?

It brought me back to my elementary school days and all the time I spent at the library then. The good library—the one in the old silo, so cozy and interesting—not sterile and cold like the gross one they built when I got a little older. I went there every week, hopping out of the car and practically running to the basement, where the children's books were shelved. I'd sit at a table by the encyclopedias to work on projects, getting up occasionally to flip through the card catalog. (Yes, there was a time in my life when books still played a primary role in research.) But, before getting to work, I'd browse through the fun stuff, particularly The Baby-sitters Club and Nancy Drew titles, taking a ridiculously long time to settle on which pile I'd be going home with that day. Those were the days...

I guess the fact that the packaging made me reminisce about my childhood library is pretty appropriate. With Volume Two, She & Him has crafted another gorgeous record that somehow already feels familiar.