zeoevil wrote:It isn't an issue of entitlement or anything of the sort. For me, it's an issue of just being a bro and releasing a few really good songs. They don't owe anyone anything and they have the right to do whatever they want with their music. However, it would be a really cool thing to do for them to take about ten of the best old songs they have and throw us a bone by releasing them. They gave Chris Cunningham hours of music and told him to go nuts. They gave some dudes a remix for their student film. The material exists in an easily released form. It would just be a cool thing to do. Casual fans aren't going to buy it. Hipsters have probably already moved on and probably won't buy it. You know who would? Me. And you, the person reading this. That's it. No more and no less. But, as it stands, and by their own admission, we won't hear any of it until their children start mining the gold that is their parent's legacy.
It would be cool of them to do it, a total bro move, but that's not really their style, is it? The archival dump makes sense for RDJ, but BoC are essentially conceptual artists. The unreleased stuff we have now was just random shit made for friends, but everything since MHTRTC has been a concept album. I don't think they're after mystique as much as they're about presenting a unified, coherent statement, and putting together an archival release that does that would take a lot of work. It's believable that they've been working on that since 09, but have been distracted by making new music, and by life. I doubt that they'd just put out a bunch of songs and say, "hey, songs! they're awesome!" Which they would be, but BoC wouldn't be satisfied with that, imo,
Mexicola wrote:Sigh. That assumes they can churn out material like a production line while maintaining the standard you've come to expect. I do despair about the 'I want it now' mentality of the internet generation at times. Slow down. Quality, not quantity. I realise I'm talking to myself by the way lol.
I agree with that and I think BoC is the type of artist that puts a little more care into the quality of presentation of their work, they're not the type to just unceremoniously dump a large swath of their music online for the taking.
My dream for some kind of reissue program someday would be proper releases of the 5 pre-Twoism releases along with Maxima. Pad each of them out with the most developed or memorable tracks from the Old Tunes tapes, release a companion disc alongside each proper album (ie. Unreleased 1998-2001 for MHTRTC, unreleased 2002-2004 for Geogaddi, etc)
That's unrealistic but more realistic than just expecting them to throw it all the wolves for the taking.
Mexicola wrote:Sigh. That assumes they can churn out material like a production line while maintaining the standard you've come to expect. I do despair about the 'I want it now' mentality of the internet generation at times. Slow down. Quality, not quantity. I realise I'm talking to myself by the way lol.
I agree with that and I think BoC is the type of artist that puts a little more care into the quality of presentation of their work, they're not the type to just unceremoniously dump a large swath of their music online for the taking.
My dream for some kind of reissue program someday would be proper releases of the 5 pre-Twoism releases along with Maxima. Pad each of them out with the most developed or memorable tracks from the Old Tunes tapes, release a companion disc alongside each proper album (ie. Unreleased 1998-2001 for MHTRTC, unreleased 2002-2004 for Geogaddi, etc)
That's unrealistic but more realistic than just expecting them to throw it all the wolves for the taking.
They've got to know that their fans would go crazy for outtakes. Most other artists would have pumped some reissues and outtakes out during the break between albums, and I wonder why they didn't. Is it because it would be egotistical to assume that people would be into leftovers, or is it because each album is a perfect product in their minds and they don't want to dilute it with songs that may be better but wouldn't fit as well. I imagine there are loads of songs recorded between Geogaddi and TCH that are better than much of the latter album but would have made the album worse. Maybe they want to avoid the situation of fans saying "X should have been on the album, it would have been so much better," which is surely something they've experienced with bands they like. Is it ego or lack of ego? Neither? And would BoC exist without pointless speculation?
I wonder how they'd present the pre-Twoism releases since they're likely very different from the aesthetic they've established (and covered a hell of a lot of ground within).
Maybe the love this Aphex dump is getting will convince Warp there's a goldmine just sitting on BoC hard drives and that all it will take to tap it is an offer that BoC can't refuse, like a lifetime of canned goods and duct tape.
Mexicola wrote:Sigh. That assumes they can churn out material like a production line while maintaining the standard you've come to expect. I do despair about the 'I want it now' mentality of the internet generation at times. Slow down. Quality, not quantity. I realise I'm talking to myself by the way lol.
I agree with that and I think BoC is the type of artist that puts a little more care into the quality of presentation of their work, they're not the type to just unceremoniously dump a large swath of their music online for the taking.
My dream for some kind of reissue program someday would be proper releases of the 5 pre-Twoism releases along with Maxima. Pad each of them out with the most developed or memorable tracks from the Old Tunes tapes, release a companion disc alongside each proper album (ie. Unreleased 1998-2001 for MHTRTC, unreleased 2002-2004 for Geogaddi, etc)
That's unrealistic but more realistic than just expecting them to throw it all the wolves for the taking.
They've got to know that their fans would go crazy for outtakes. Most other artists would have pumped some reissues and outtakes out during the break between albums, and I wonder why they didn't. Is it because it would be egotistical to assume that people would be into leftovers, or is it because each album is a perfect product in their minds and they don't want to dilute it with songs that may be better but wouldn't fit as well. I imagine there are loads of songs recorded between Geogaddi and TCH that are better than much of the latter album but would have made the album worse. Maybe they want to avoid the situation of fans saying "X should have been on the album, it would have been so much better," which is surely something they've experienced with bands they like. Is it ego or lack of ego? Neither? And would BoC exist without pointless speculation?
I wonder how they'd present the pre-Twoism releases since they're likely very different from the aesthetic they've established (and covered a hell of a lot of ground within).
Maybe the love this Aphex dump is getting will convince Warp there's a goldmine just sitting on BoC hard drives and that all it will take to tap it is an offer that BoC can't refuse, like a lifetime of canned goods and duct tape.
Hey, like you posts, keep going,
Something tells that the TCH was somehow very special for the bands artistic step. Something did or did not worked with it. Because for me TCH looks like very ambitious album, like, not just the change in sound and tracks, but I remember reading their interview from that period (I was very new to their music) and was almost shocked how they look to me comparing to that, how I felt about them from Geogaddi. Something like,they want to see their music beside bands like ABBA. For me it was very weird..Now I think it was very productive period for them and maybe something didn't worked out how they wanted..
also you said that this period between Geogaddi and TCH was very prolific for the band, but how do you feel about the period between TCH and TH, I feel that they closed door behind them and also changed something from their artistic perspective.
The rules are a bit dumb in my opinion. They're also THEIR rules - the end.
I don't respect all of it but I have absolutely no part in it whatsoever.
I also don't think the "godly" BoC wants to keep material unreleased because it's so amazing. I think there's legitimate reasons for not releasing certain material.
Okay. I hadn't kept up with this thread past the first page. I'm not going to read OP's novella on page three - no offense. I've said I need to say about this.
On a related note, I don't think that the "I'm involved somehow" mindset is a generational thing as was suggested. Possibly an age/maturity thing. Every generation will have its equivalents. Different forms, same shit at the core of the discourse. May not be music for a particular generation. It seems it's something relative to sincere support, respect and understanding (whether you have these things or not and to what capacity).
I just think it's really hard work being a fan of this band, and sometimes it's like trekking across a quagmire. It can suck your energy away and sometimes you just wanna yell at the top of your lungs how pissed off you are about it lol. I don't see what's wrong with that.
Everyone is saying how Richard is all high fives with his fanbase and how just dumping over 100 tunes was the kind of thing he would do. You got that way wrong! It wasn't too long ago (before Syro was released) that his fanbase had resigned to the fact he hated them, and was retired, never to be heard of again. So you can't say for sure that BOC don't also have something really cool planned. You just can't say for sure.
But for can say for sure they test the patience of Buddha.
Najlepsiejszy wrote:The rules are dumb, because they make the fans bored. I've listened to their albums many times, I know them "by heart", and there aren't many things for me to discover except for some single melodies hidden here and there. Lush tracks are good, but after you listen to them a hundred times, you know what happens when exactly and the feeling of being overwhelmed by the details goes away. We NEED more stuff to keep us excited.
Dude, you must have awesome ears! I still find new things in Geogaddi, and I bought it the day it came out. Try taking a break from BOC for a while. There is a whole big huge world full of music to discover. Vast quantities! It sounds like you are fatigued from too much BOC. Trust me, I want to hear new BOC just as much as the next guy, but their sound is achieved by years of manipulating and it's a huge process that takes a lot of time. Plus they have family lives and other stuff going on. My key point is they have to let the music evolve to get it to sound the way they do and this takes a lot of time. Hang in there man;-)
Interesting thread. In regards to Aphex Twin releasing all this stuff on soundcloud, there is an interesting thing he said about releasing the old stuff he had.
"I recently tried to craft an oldschool compilation. I literally have hundreds of tracks from around Selected Ambient Works 85-92. But after three hours I already gave up. I tried it a few more times, but I just cant get trough that pile of music. After three hours I dont even know why I'm doing this, it feels so pointless"
It occurs to me that maybe BoC might have a similar problem. Cataloging all of you unreleased work is probably easier than trying to put together an accessible way to present such a body of work.
I think it's pretty interesting how people seem to forget that such an act would be an about face on their stance on the internet in general. It's highly unlikely that suddenly do that. Another thing to consider as well is whether they would bother doing it because they know that in all likely hood people would end up complaining that they didn't do all of it or whatever.
I find these demands that they release their old stuff or their newer stuff quicker completely baffling - they've every right to do whatever they want with their music, and don't owe anything to anyone.
