Nick Mitchell
The Campfire Headphase – Boards Of Canada
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There is something oddly addictive about the music of Boards of Canada. Not only are they one of the rare ‘electronica’ outfits with definite crossover appeal, but one listen to their music (usually via the word-of-mouth channel – the band are evidently averse to publicity of any kind) seems to convert many into dedicated fanatics. The fuzzy splendour of 1998’s Music Has the Right to Children, followed by the darker, only slightly inferior Geogaddi in 2002, won over many a curious ear to their unique ambient/hip-hop musical aesthetic. A further appeal of BoC to some, perhaps, is their very obscurity – dropping their name in the right circles makes you sound oh so knowledgeable and hip. Apparently.
But it would be incredibly unfair to dismiss BoC as a ‘fashionably-cool’ band and nothing more. On the contrary, the duo of Michael Sandison and Marcus Eoin, who record from a secret location in Scotland’s Pentland Hills, have been making music since the early Eighties, and their unique sound – sometimes epic, sometimes eerie, often both – possesses a grandiose, nostalgic quality which remains untarnished after many a listen.
BoC’s originality lies in making electronic music that is still somehow warm and organic. This feat is perhaps explained by the fact that it’s not ‘all about the synths’, so to speak. In a rare interview, Sandison once claimed that they did use instruments – pianos, flutes, guitars etc – but then “mangled them beyond all recognition”. So the fact that you can hear guitars (and they’re quite clearly guitars) on the band’s long-awaited new LP The Campfire Headphase will come as quite a shock to fans. The album begins in familiar territory, with the briefest wave of pure melancholia that is ‘Into the Rainbow Vein’, before breaking, rather outrageously, into the bold, trebly guitars of ‘Chromakey Dreamcoat’. Strangely enough, this new dimension to the sound complements the lush harmonies and programmed beats rather well, and the sense of novelty soon melts away in the dreamy mood of the music.
However, the one unavoidable downside of BoC’s instrumental overhaul is that the guitar-driven songs are that bit more accessible, that bit more blatant, and that bit less challenging. A stand-out track is ‘Davyan Cowboy’, a slow-burner that rises to a climactic cacophony of thrilling beats, stately guitar-strumming and rousing strings. The problem with such uninhibited, in-your-face grandeur is that it’s easy to imagine the song playing in the background as some pinstriped young ad exec eagerly nods along at the pitch of his new big-budget commercial for Honda or Audi. Still, the over-catchiness of a hook is hardly the worst criticism you can level at a song.
The Campfire Headphase is more a sonic ‘detour’ than an entirely ‘new direction’ for the band. True, the guitars have an adverse, simplifying effect in some places, but other tracks are classic BoC, at their mind-bendingly expressive best. They reach a summit of experimental virtuosity in the quirkily named ‘Oscar See Through the Red Eye’, a darkly evocative whirlpool of trippy beeps and fx, undercut by foreboding harmonies which will send a shiver down your spine at its inception.
Unfortunately, such moments of drama are too thinly-spread in this weighty, hour-long affair. It seems that, in order to balance out the mainstream-connotations of the guitars, Sandison and Eoin have interspersed the good stuff (which is, happily, the majority) with dull fillers of quiet ambience. (The last two tracks fade out over such a long time that you actually forget the album’s still playing.)
Perhaps The Campfire Headphase could have been a great album; perhaps BoC’s greatest yet, if only the duo had exercised some ruthlessness in the mixing process. As it is, the third album from BoC is a rather bi-polar creature. Some tracks soar effortlessly, some brood menacingly, but others just meander lifelessly. Nevertheless, such complex fare will undoubtedly please fans, widen their appeal and enrapture critics. Their talent is branching out in interesting ways: perhaps the next release will be something truly special.
