The Campfire Headphase 20 Years Later

[fujee]

This was the album that got me into the band. Quite the 'coming of age' moment. I heard it and was like 'Ah, so music doesn't have to be how I think it is'. Never looked back from there. Still listen to it too. The whole thing is just crunchy in the best possible way.

[Altruizine]

The production still holds up today. Perhaps surpisingly so? As far as BoC’s own discography goes, this record is more hi-fi and detailed than the previous ones, whether you like it or not. Listen to 84 Pontiac Dream, so much going on there.

You give some top producer BoC’s equipment and they wouldn’t be able to replicate their sound with it, that’s how good they are

[Altruizine]

Btw fun fact I was 14 when I started listening to BoC and this record and Tears From The Compound Eye was one of my favorites but I didn't know compound eye was a real term for insect eyes. I imagined some kind of figurative eye that represented a human compound, perhaps a cult. To this day that's the way I like to think of the track

[Wildfire]

You give some top producer BoC’s equipment and they wouldn’t be able to replicate their sound with it, that’s how good they are

Agreed, they are elite level engineers and producers.

[valleaux]

TCH was my first album of theirs that I bought, so it is very near and dear to me. I had saved up some money in high school and asked my folks to take me into the city to a kind of indie record store that I figured would have BoC. I specifically wanted a vinyl record because I had just gotten a hand-me-down turntable and sound system. I was going to get MHTRTC, since I thought it made sense to listen from the beginning of the discography (and I think I also consulted one of those internet "getting into this band" flowcharts for BoC, haha), but they didn't have it in stock. I think I just chose at random between TCH and TH.

Obviously all four albums are sonically and tonally quite different, and no other artist quite sounds like BoC, but something about TCH has always sounded the most unique and fresh to me. The guitar/synth pad/thick organic-feeling drums sonic palette is so great. I also always liked how it's definitely the "lightest" sounding album. The other albums definitely have some kind of unsettling/sinister undertones, and so does TCH here and there, but it definitely feels like it has the least "anxiety" to its sound, if that makes sense.

[Den]

TCH was my first album of theirs that I bought, so it is very near and dear to me. I had saved up some money in high school and asked my folks to take me into the city to a kind of indie record store that I figured would have BoC. I specifically wanted a vinyl record because I had just gotten a hand-me-down turntable and sound system. I was going to get MHTRTC, since I thought it made sense to listen from the beginning of the discography (and I think I also consulted one of those internet "getting into this band" flowcharts for BoC, haha), but they didn't have it in stock. I think I just chose at random between TCH and TH.

Obviously all four albums are sonically and tonally quite different, and no other artist quite sounds like BoC, but something about TCH has always sounded the most unique and fresh to me. The guitar/synth pad/thick organic-feeling drums sonic palette is so great. I also always liked how it's definitely the "lightest" sounding album. The other albums definitely have some kind of unsettling/sinister undertones, and so does TCH here and there, but it definitely feels like it has the least "anxiety" to its sound, if that makes sense.

Beautiful. And it makes perfect sense - I remember them saying that they wanted to make Campfire Headphase a sanctuary.

[Soul_Slip]

This was the album that got me into the band. Quite the 'coming of age' moment. I heard it and was like 'Ah, so music doesn't have to be how I think it is'. Never looked back from there. Still listen to it too. The whole thing is just crunchy in the best possible way.

I had a similar experience and reaction when I first heard TCH. My friend David showed them to me at a campfire and the guitar riff to Chromakey Dreamcoat made me do a double take and then he showed me Dayvan Cowboy and I was like “aha! so guitar based music doesn’t have to sound the same and music can be made this way…” It made me rethink what it means to be a musician and music listener overall. TCH has a special place in my heart. Satellite Anthem Icarus still gives me chills the same as ever. Great thread.

[Group Hex]

The guitar never clicked with me. I like several songs on this album, but the guitar based ones I pass on most every time. I’m ok with that.

[razlomlogic]

I like Trans Canada Highway more



Different culture

[valleaux]

Beautiful. And it makes perfect sense - I remember them saying that they wanted to make Campfire Headphase a sanctuary.

"Sanctuary" is a great word for it!

[Soul_Slip]

I like Trans Canada Highway more



Different culture

Not sure what culture would have anything to do with it lol…. its called just different personal preferences

[Redd Panderson]

Beautiful. And it makes perfect sense - I remember them saying that they wanted to make Campfire Headphase a sanctuary.

"Sanctuary" is a great word for it!

You know, comfortably fitting in with the feeling of sanctuary, there's a beauty to TCH being the middle album in their 5-album mainline discography. If you compare that symmetry to the symmetry of Collapse being the middle track on Tomorrow's Harvest, the same radial pattern exists as sitting around a campfire.

And if they happen to do a sixth album ("completing the hexagon"), then the two middle albums--TCH and TH--will VERY much be yin and yang takes on the idea of a radial pattern around a fire.

It would really reinforce the themes of spiritual bliss and precarious religious devotion teetering on wrath, corruption, and downfall.

[Scories]

This is the BoC album I listen to most often. I don’t get that exhausting feeling that they’re manipulating me or playing with my mind. I also think it’s their most authentic and personal album. They come across as neither too mysterious nor cynical, while still letting genuine emotions and a real sense of sadness shine through toward the end.
Could it be that “Farewell Fire” evokes the mourning of their childhood friend nicknamed “The Color of Fire” (“I Love You”)?
I wouldn’t be surprised if the next album, which is more impersonal, was a sort of reaction to the fact that many listeners didn’t appreciate such a sincere work as much.

[Mexicola]

Massively underrated. Slow This Bird Down remains a glorious fever dream of a track.

[A_Northern_Soul]

It’s the album that I come back to the most too. It’s possibly because it’s the one I can put on that is the most ambient - in the Eno sense of the word - music that is there to soundtrack other *stuff*; not in a muzak sense; more in the sense that it just feels part of the environment? MHTRTC is similar in that sense.

Geogaddi is incredible but it can be a tough listen; it’s a bit like something like In Utero or Closer by Joy Division; you have to be “ready” for it. As for TH… I just don’t particularly enjoy it that much - I find a lot of it too cold and jarring…


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[Skimming Stone]

The only album of theirs I haven't fully clicked with unfortunately. The mood it captures is unlike anything else in their discog, the production is immaculate, but there's just something about the way the tracks develop that doesn't keep me hooked for their full duration.

84 Pontiac Dream is absolutely brilliant though, and I dream of being able to produce anything even 10% as good

[jcnporter]

It's not my favourite summer album, but it's the first one I'd take on a drive though the countryside on a hazy summer's day, every time.

[rd1994]

I do think this is their "catchiest" album

I know I know someone might be like "catchy? huh?" but in particular to the rest of their discography theres some incredibly catchy stuff on here.

[turquoise70]

Chromakey Dreamcoat, Oscar See Through Red Eye and Macquarie Ridge are all-time essentials for me.

[fujee]

Oscar See Through Red Eye is criminally underrated. The first BoC track I heard, so maybe some nostalgia bias but it undeniably slaps.