bored of canada
Inferno, the new Boards of Canada album, is released this week; coming thirteen years after their last album Tomorrow's Harvest.
After a 13 year wait, the fanbase is sufficiently excited to hear it. It has, however, already received a lukewarm review from The Guardian, basically calling it boring and that we've heard it all before.
This is a particular problem for a band like BoC - and Portishead before them. They have a signature sound, a specific aesthetic that is unique to them. If they change their sound they run the risk of alienating the fans who want to hear more of the stuff they like. If they stay the same then they're boring and predictable, we've Heard It All Before.
(Their album 'The Campfire Headphase' is widely accepted to be their weakest effort among fans, mainly because it diverted somewhat from the BoC formula by adding guitars and real drums to the mix).
Boards of Canada's music mainly consists of analogue synthesisers; drum loops or drum machines; vocal samples scattered around that have been taken from old documentaries, 1970s Sesame Street episodes and National Film Board of Canada films - all of it processed, distressed and distorted through devilishly clever recording techniques. Woven together it creates a warm, sometimes unsettlingly hazy, nostalgic vibe that causes an emotional reaction in listeners of a certain age.
Their music has been deconstructed and analysed to death. People have tried to work out how they get their synthesisers to sound like they're being played down a GPO telephone line in 1972, or broadcast over shortwave radio. Virtual synthesisers have been developed that enable music software users to accurately recreate BoC sounds simply and quickly on a basic laptop. Nowadays it's a piece of piss to make a cod-BoC track. Recently I downloaded an album off Bandcamp by an artist who had perfectly recreated their sound. As a thought experiment it was impressive, but it rang hollow somehow, as if the heart and meaning were missing. It was as if it was created just to make a point - 'see how easy this is?'
It kind of dilutes what the band do, it dilutes the pioneering work they've done in music and sound design.
Maybe that's why it's taken thirteen years to create this new record. The pressure to innovate without alienating their fanbase, the weight of that decade-and-a-bit of silence. The need to create something that doesn't sound like an idiot like me has knocked it out in an afternoon on a 10 year old Lenovo ThinkPad. That must have weighed heavily on them during the creative process.
Whatever. I'm buzzing to hear it. It's Boards of fucking Canada, baby. Back after thirteen years.