Boards Of Canada
Hi Scores EP
(Skam)
Right off the bat I'm going to just say that if you enjoy BOC's album Music Has The Right To Children, you're going to like this EP of older (but re-released) material. The 6 track EP came out in 1996, almost 2 full years before their full-length, but you'd never really know from listening to it (despite some old-school sounding beats on one track). Instead of tinkering with their sound for very long, the duo must have definitely hit the ground running and in doing so have in a short time established themselves as a very solid group in IDM land.
Hi Scores is 33 minutes of gurgling, bleeping bliss of rolling beats and warm tones. The disc starts off the title track of the release and makes the listener feel right at home with a track that captures all the interesting thing that the group does. With a rather minor tone that wavers ever so slightly and a beat that thunks along in the background with just the right amount of fuzz, it's melodic and catchy and melts down perfectly into "Turquoise Hexagon Sun" (the only track from Music Has The Right To Childen that also appears here).
Things change up a bit on "Nlogax" with a beat during the intro that sounds surprisingly like something that Daft Punk might concoct. It doesn't stay that way forever, though, and although the track features some rather old-school electronic sounds, there is no doubt who's put it together. The second half of the album is super-solid as well, with the bleep antics of "June 9th," the soft groove of "Seeya Later," and the rather haunting closer of "Everything You Do is a Balloon." Overall, it's more good music from the group and I for one am glad that Skam re-released this disc in more of a quantity. Plus, it makes the wait until the next full-length a little easier to bear.
Rating: 7.75
