Boards Of Canada - Geogaddi

TRANSMISSIONS FROM THE DUGA RADAR

Months after I graduated college I found myself working local news as an overnight, do-it-all television junky running from one position to the next. On slow nights, when only myself and a producer filled two chairs in an otherwise-large building, I took to wandering the empty rooms in search of mundane, office-related mysteries. Apart from some decades-old viewer complaints soiled on musty printer paper, nothing caught the eye or captured the imagination. Except for one long, dark hallway whose sole light flickered dimly in the distance. Doors were left ajar on either side, peering into further blackness. To muster some sensation from these uneventful nights, I took to traversing this hallway, skin crawling up my spine, as 'Gyroscope' played, ricocheting off unseen shadows and barely perceptible surfaces. It was manufactured terror. It was Geogaddi.

While Boards Of Canada's Music Has The Right To Children still holds the title as their magnum opus, its successor delved even further into the enigmatic beast that came to define their production style. Vintage vocal samples scuffed by decades of deterioration, Field Recordings of microscopic beings shuffling indiscriminately, radio interference intruding upon nefarious dealings, loops of grandiose prominence cascading like streams, stardust twinkling in the ethosphere, chemical reactions drawing symbolism to nature's intrinsic symmetries, and children whooping and hollering just for good measure. Geogaddi, and Boards Of Canada by extension, exist in a world like no other. One that, at times, feels entirely inverted to ours. Perhaps even an alternate dimension, captured and imprinted with every click of the Polaroid, on images accosted by our sun.

Within their world, patterns emerge. For every IDM centerpiece lies an intersecting idea, an interlude composited of educational recordings ('Dandelion'), dead channel transmissions ('The Smallest Weird Number'), island ambiance ('Opening The Mouth'), or even silence ('Magic Window'). The jumbled distortion of 'A Is To B As B Is To C' even predates Vaporwave's surrealism by a solid decade. These moments peel back the fabric of Electronica, filling the gaps with mind-melting fluff, as a story would when taking a detour to expand upon the lore. Snapshots of another time engrave themselves in these moments, like the remnants of Chernobyl has to the landscape of Pripyat. In fact, that ghost city - and its haunting echoes of still life - bears the closest resemblance to Geogaddi's aura. Both in the stoicism of each interlude, and the catapulting tracks that feel like fissures cracking through the seams. Though stilted, 'Julie & Candy' and 'Dawn Chorus' sound like nuclear explosions, complete with disembodied voices of playground children running for the hills. More technical tracks, like the lauded 'Music Is Math' and 'Alpha & Omega,' twist knobs, sizzle in beakers, and attempt to control the uncontrollable.

Then there's 'The Beach At Redpoint' and 'You Could Feel The Sky,' songs that worship nature at the cost of their own intrusion. Like humans invading pristine lands, becoming one with the environment, whilst leaving footprints in the soil. Except in Boards Of Canada's case, the effects are far more imposing and deadly, distorting serenity with a deluge of harmful chemicals and mechanical austerity. Yet, despite their far-reaching influences, Boards Of Canada's identity works through unbreakable synergy. The atmosphere of Geogaddi is flawless, delicately weaving the unnatural with the organic, tenderness with brutal systems. Despite all these interworking parts, Geogaddi appears effortless. Considering the genre, that is the true triumph.