The great Campfire Headphase mystery
A sure sign that a meme has run its course: Target now sells “Vote For Pedro” t-shirts.
For anyone with an iota of good musical taste, Boards Of Canada are the greatest Scotsmen to ever touch analog synthesizers. The announcement of their hotly anticipated first new release in three years, The Campfire Headphase, has internet-savvy music geeks of the Stereogum stripe scrambling to find legitimate advance copies online. I wish I could say I’m above all that, but the other day I succumbed and downloaded a .torrent file claiming to be the new BoC album.
I’ve got to say, whatever I’ve downloaded isn’t bad. It’s got all the Boards Of Canada signature elements: the warbly, aforementioned analog synths, the scratchy, occasionally off-kilter drumbeats, and the processed, barely-human vocals. It even has twelve silent phantom tracks at the end, recalling a similar trick on their previous album. So, it’s good; I like it. The problem is, it’s not Boards Of Canada good. I mean, it sounds like something a very smart laptopper would produce if someone told him to do an impression of Boards Of Canada. It’s almost too melodic, too friendly, with none of the evil, half-asleep nightmarish sounds that made Geogaddi so damn compelling. Plus, it was way too easy to just go and torrent a bootlegged advance copy of such a highly anticpated release. You’d think Warp would be a little more protective of the thing. They might even have someone else on their roster create a hoax version to alternately tantalize and thwart us downloaders.
There is some other, more concrete evidence that the thing is a hoax: I’ve heard two supposedly legitimate tracks from reputable mp3 sites that share titles with two of the songs on my torrent, but sound nothing like them. I suppose that pretty much puts the matter to rest. But I still want to find out where my counterfeit copy, or whatever it is, came from. Because it may not be Boards Of Canada, but it’s still pretty good. According to the Stereogum thread I linked to above, the version I have is almost definitely not the new album; it’s either a counterfeit by another artist whose music recalls BoC, or unreleased early tracks by the duo.
But all of this raises some questions about the whole illegal-mp3-downloading phenomenon, wholly apart from issues of copyright infringement and RIAA-appeasement: aside from the satisfaction that you’ve done the ethically upright thing, waiting until the official release and then actually buying the CD ensures that you don’t ruin the surprise, and you don’t fall for any spurious versions floating around cyberspace. A whole new cottage industry could spring up around artists who craft counterfeit versions of highly anticipated albums—the musical equivalent of painters whose entire ouevre consists of very accurate fakes.
So, I get to look forward to October 17 along with the rest of the world, and in the meantime, I’ve got this anonymous set of tunes that are still pretty damn good.
Posted: September 8th, 2005 under Music.
Comments: 21
Comments
Comment from John
Time: 8 September 2005, 08:13
I found a shirt that says “Pedro Lacks Political Experience.”
Though I’ve heard you mention BoC, I have not investigated much. I supposed I should get on that.
Comment from Joe
Time: 9 September 2005, 03:10
I think I might have a legit copy, but I’m not sure. if it’s not legit, what’s Carter’s iPod good for anyway?
P.S. specificobjects.net rules.
Comment from Carter
Time: 9 September 2005, 04:32
My copy is indeed legit–we got it straight from Warp, and I don’t think they’d give us a fake since we book BoC.
Where did you find your stuff? I’m curious to hear it. It’s too bad you don’t live in Chicago anymore, or you could just come and listen to the real thing.
Comment from jONATHAN
Time: 11 September 2005, 03:21
someone who sounds very much like boards of canada
not very well know. someone may have put this on soulseek under the BoC name??
Comment from Jake
Time: 11 September 2005, 07:18
Update: I got the offical, real, offically real promo copy from IndieTorrents. So I guess I’m going to ruin the October 17 release date for myself after all. My desire to hear excellent new music has won out yet again.
Comment from JOnY
Time: 12 September 2005, 08:22
Will someone invite me to join indie torrents pls.
(no harm asking, right?)
Also, I have two version of TCFHP - how do I know which one is legit?
Comment from Jake
Time: 12 September 2005, 16:13
I can’t invite you because I haven’t uploaded/seeded enough to IT to get that level of priveleges. I joined back when you didn’t need an invitation, so I’m not sure how it works now.
The (supposedly) legit version of CfHp is exactly 62:00 minutes long and has 15 tracks. The bogus version I downloaded earlier has 12 tracks of silence towards the end, and none of the tracks match up with the legit version in terms of track length or sequence. Still don’t know who that version’s by.
Comment from Steve
Time: 13 September 2005, 05:51
There is a legitamate track from the new record posted on scissorkick.com
Comment from Fake
Time: 13 September 2005, 22:22
Jake, I have listened to the new “real promo copy” and I think it sounds even more fake then the first fake. It’s 2 simple. Using guitarr strings and simple melodies, I could not even manage myself to listen through it cause it sounded fake. The first “fake album”, was really good and I actually believed it to be BOC.
Comment from alijason
Time: 15 September 2005, 00:37
I’m pretty sure i have the real deal - and all the comments are spot on.
The new boc album is very polished, real guitars, no kids voices etc - It was posted at glassdanse.com on 8th september.
The only dark track is “slow this bird down” there is still some presence of the analogue sounds on several tracks, but it is a change in direction. Its a good album but I dont think It will be played much - Maybe a slow burner?
Im kinda hoping Ive got a fake copy - but I dont so!!
Comment from mount maxwell
Time: 15 September 2005, 10:09
The best tracks on the first “good” faked version of “The Campfire Headphase” are by a group called “Freescha.” I especially liked the one that sounded like a bumblebee crying over piano.
I also have the real deal now and and find myself listening to the faked “freescha” tracks more than the actual album. What the hell happened to Boards of Canada? Where are the dynamics, the twists and turns, the INVENTIVENESS of their early albums?
Comment from Ryan
Time: 15 September 2005, 15:36
Go to www.bleep.com and listen to samples to the whole album. You’ll then know if you have the real one or not.
If this is indeed a fake, a lot of effort went into making it. Either way, it’s really good.
Comment from Jake
Time: 15 September 2005, 15:56
I’m pretty sure I’ve got the real version, which I grabbed from IndieTorrents. They presumably had a couple bogus versions up before the real one was posted. They’re very diligent about fakes, and so I trust them most of the time.
Whatever I did end up downloading has pretty much been on constant rotation at home, especially when I’m reading or sleeping. It’s not as sinister as Geogaddi or as euphoric as MHtRtC, but it’s still beautiful in its own right. I woudn’t want them to keep re-making Music, would you?
Plus, I just get tired of people immediately dismissing a cherished artist’s latest effort because it doesn’t blow their head clean off the way an old favorite does. “Figure 8 is no Roman Candle.” Well, no; of course it’s not. It’s called artistic development.
Comment from mount maxwell
Time: 25 September 2005, 13:15
Artistic development would be quite exciting. What we have here is refinement, which is not the same thing.
I’m all for BOC developing. To be honest, I was excited as hell when I read that they were going to go in a more organic direction, away from the trappings of IDM and into truly uncharted territory. I couldn’t wait to hear what that territory sounded like, even if it happened to be too strange for me. What we got instead was an unbelievably lifeless, ridiculously predictable version of old Boards of Canada, but devoid of the spontaneity, dynamics, and creativity that were the hallmarks of those early releases.
Anyone who thinks that this polished, bland starbucks soundtrack of an album is a step forward should have their head examined.
It’s mannerism, guys!
Comment from WarpRunner
Time: 27 September 2005, 23:17
You can download the entire album off of the warp website itself if you are a little creative with a flash decompiler.
And the new album is a bit dissapointing. Its much more technical, much more polished, but not nearly as intricate. It has its place, but it won’t get as much playtime as their other releases.
I am actually pretty excited by what this release might mean. It shows that they have become much more adept at incorporating a wide variety of sounds into a coherent melody. I envision a future album with the complexity of geogaddi and the relaxing quality of twoism.
Comment from Rakel
Time: 30 September 2005, 02:38
Anybody ever figure out what that track was that had the sample “I was kind of on my own” in one of the fake sets with all the Freescha tunes? There are also other tracks in there that are not Freescha.
Comment from MattC_UK
Time: 4 October 2005, 10:21
I’ve matched up some of the fake BOC tracks against their real identities as Freescha tracks.
Fake BOC Track vs Real Track (Artist - Album - Track Name)
01 - Into The Rainbow Vein = Freescha - Kids Fill The Floor - 11 Sotopes
03 - Satellite Anthem Icarus = Freescha - Kids Fill The Floor - 12 Up The Coast
07 - ‘84 Pontiac Dream = Freescha - Kids Fill The Floor - 04 Kid Brother
[POSSIBLE] 08 - Sherbert Head = Freescha - What’s Come Inside You - 05 Drive Me Wide
11 - Hey Saturday Sun = Freescha - Kids Fill The Floor - 09 Cherry Blue Boo
12 - Constants Are Changing = Freescha - Kids Fill The Floor - 10 Henry Hudson
I am now more or less convinced that this has been a guerrilla marketing campaign by the band Freescha, who probably feel they’ve been unjustly ignored by the BOC-adoring crowd. So they’ve hijacked the album release. I think it’s worked, too.
boy did they have me fooled.
Comment from Fake
Time: 17 October 2005, 20:56
MattC_UK, I have listened to the Fresscha songs you mentioned. + the albums “Kids Hit The Floor” and “What’s Come Inside You”. Maybe we have different “fake BoC” albums, but one thing that makes my album special, is that it’s very good and that no-one have identified any of those songs yet. Minimum 4 stars. The second track on it use the sample’s “I just like to tell you, accept me for who I am… Fallen from the tree of life… I was kind of on my own…”
Why I care so much, is because I think it’s better then the original. And that everyone keeps saying it’s Freescha, when it’s not.
Pingback from manunderstress.com » Blog Archive » The Perils of P2P
Time: 28 October 2005, 09:11
[…] Finally, yesterday, I made it to the store to purchase the CD (yes, I purchase most of the music I actually like), popped it in the CD player and WHAT?!?!? Not what I had been listening to. At all. Remotely. I had been duped. I quickly learned that there were a lot of fakes going around before Campfire Headphase was released. I got fooled like that guy did. And I am also curious as to who authored the pretty good BoC fake. Or if it wasn’t perhaps BoC themselves. I wonder, could it have been an illegal file sharing network flood, like Madonna’s infamous “What the f— do you think you’re doing?”, an entire fake album released by Boards of Canada themselves? Perhaps it was an fake album of outtakes, or a file-sharing only version of the release. The latter makes a lot of sense to me. With your album release you simultaneously release a version of it for the P2P networks. A different version. It would drum up publicity for yourself, obscure the new release in a flood of fakes, and offer fans two for the price of one. Wait, didn’t Fiona Apple do that? Not quite, but she certainly took advantage of the fact that p2p networks are here to stay, in a brilliant way. She created fake drama about herself. But concerning Boards of Canada, the problem with my theory is that now that I have heard the “real” release, it is far, far superior to the fake. So why would the band want to release an inferior variant? […]
Comment from Jersey
Time: 15 November 2005, 07:09
I found the same fake as #18 and am really wondering who it is. I love the tracks, and while all the tracks dont have a consistent quality to them, there are enough great ones that I’d say its better (say it aint so!) than the actual new BoC album. Anyone find out who it is? God would I like to know. I especially love the fake ataronchronon track.
Comment from Gustavo
Time: 29 November 2006, 13:46
Does anyone else have the fake version of “Hey Saturday Sun” (3.38)??? I want to know the real name of the band and the song, please. Help!
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