Music similar to Boards of Canada?

April 22, 2006 3:15 PM

I really, really, like Boards of Canada. What other similar music might I like?

Other stuff I already listen to: Aphex Twin, Orb, Orbital.

posted by Otis to Media & Arts (38 answers total)

Certain Mouse On Mars records may really appeal to you - Vulvaland being one of my favorites.

Prefuse 73 and Savath and Savalas both do slightly-glitchy, melodic ambient work as well, The latter may be closer to the sound you're looking for. especially on Aprop'at.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 3:22 PM on April 22, 2006

Last FM recommends (top ten, in order):
1 Aphex Twin
2 Autechre
3 Four Tet
4 Squarepusher
5 Plaid
6 Prefuse 73
7 Air
8 DJ Shadow
9 Mogwai
10 AFX
posted by Hogshead at 3:27 PM on April 22, 2006

Check out this great askMeFi, it has tons of great suggestions for (somewhat) similar music.
posted by patr1ck at 3:28 PM on April 22, 2006

I'd recommend tstewart's Living Exponentially.
posted by influx at 3:29 PM on April 22, 2006

MusicPlasma is your friend.

I'm supposed to like Boards of Canada but don't have much of an opinion either way.

Try Tortoise and Built to Spill.

Also: g
posted by scarabic at 3:38 PM on April 22, 2006

Also: g
posted by scarabic at 3:38 PM on April 22, 2006

You might also like -
Isan, Christ (get the pylonesque ep), Marumari, Freescha, Casino Versus Japan, Astrobotnia.
Hmm I could go on, but they are getting a bit far from BoC.
posted by scodger at 3:54 PM on April 22, 2006

I love BoC... all of the above are good suggestions. some more you might like... not necessarily all BoC sound alikes, but if you like BoC, i think there are elements of all of these you could really get into..

Godspeed You Black Emperor
Mum
Manitoba
Rachels
DJ Shadow
Greg Davis
Amon Tobin
Boom Bip
The Books
Dntel
Arovane
Max Richter
Tadd Mullinix
Metrovavan
Pulseprogramming
Isan
Juana Molina
Cyann & Ben
Ignatius
Clue to Kalo
Bovaflux
Tortoise
The Appleseed Cast
Friends of Dean Martinez
Explosions in the Sky
Keith Fullerton Whitman
Mount Eerie/ The Microphones
Do Make Say Think
posted by ab3 at 4:01 PM on April 22, 2006

telefon tel aviv - fahrenheit fair enough, immediate action ep
arovane - atol scrap & tides
phonem - hydro electric
sovacusa - centrepoint
posted by juv3nal at 4:01 PM on April 22, 2006

I love BoC too. Here's some artists and labels you might check out. See discogs.com for details about record names, etc.

Artists:

Bola. Fantastic, soaring, intricate electronica. Like a moodier cousin of BoC. When robots rise to rebuild the world after the war has turned everything to ashes, this is music they will be listening to as they plow away under a bloody red sunset. Or something. Get the Soup LP - a classic in my book.

Christ. The Pete Best of BoC, as in the guy who worked with the BoC boys before their world domination. Very BoC-like music if without as many pastoral touches. Try the Pylonesque EP.

Kettel. Has done many diff types of music, but check out his "Look at This! Ha ha ha!" EP which has some excellent takes of the lovely spring-like feel of some BoC tunes.

Ulrich Schnauss. BoC meets Slowdive. Mixes gentle electronica with shoegaze-like dreaminess. I prefer his first LP.

Casino Vs Japan. Might be accused of borrowing a tad too much from BoC, but I'm a slut for this sort of melodic electronica. Try their Go Hawaii LP.

Lackluster. Mostly IDM and ambience. Start with his Container LP.

Plod. Made some IDM records full of warmth, somewhere between BoC and Plaid. Get the Pillow Talk LP.

Metamatics. Ranges from fast shifty stuff to slow ambient stuff. Try the Spook Tinsel Shoal LP for low-key, warm stuff.

CiM. Mostly jagged, fast, melodic IDM, but his Reference LP has moments of gentler beauty.

Plaid / The Black Dog. More quirky and frenetic than BoC in terms of beats, but the naive-sounding melodies might appeal. Try any of the Black Dog LPs (the last track off Spanners might fit) or Plaid's Double Figure LP.

Global Goon. Much closer to Aphex Twin's playful and wacky stuff. (GG is supposed to have been RDJ's flatmate?) The first album has the feel of music made by and for children, which might appeal to BoC fans.

Labels:

Skam. Try the Skampler compilation. The Lego Feet tracks are fantastic.

Clear. Try the Gescom (Autechre) EP or the It's All Becoming... compilation.

deFocus. Clear became deFocus. Try the Did You See compilation.

Neo Ouija. Run by Metamatics, I believe. Try any of the Cottage Industries compilation series.
posted by shortfuse at 4:03 PM on April 22, 2006

Shpongle!
posted by geoff. at 4:09 PM on April 22, 2006

Caribou
Xiu Xiu
posted by special-k at 4:11 PM on April 22, 2006

Definitely, definitely Lanterna. I recommend their album "Elm Street" as a good starting point.
posted by symphonik at 4:19 PM on April 22, 2006

(Oh, I also second Ulrich Schnauss.)
posted by symphonik at 4:20 PM on April 22, 2006

Tycho is the only musician I've heard who sounds exactly like Boards of Canada, other than BOC. Enough that even after listening to his cd dozens of times, and saw him play live twice, I hear a track and think "wait, is this some unrelease BOC track I should know?"

If you're big complaint is that there aren't enough slightly different BOC tracks to listen to, get sunrise projector and it will help a little.
posted by aubilenon at 4:23 PM on April 22, 2006

I've said it before: Tycho. The album is streamable on his site.
posted by jgee at 4:26 PM on April 22, 2006

Or, what aubilenon said. None of my friends who are into BoC have been disappointed with Tycho.
posted by jgee at 4:28 PM on April 22, 2006

Morr Music's Putting The Morr Back In Morrissey compilation is oft-recommended as an intro to BoC-style IDM music..

Land of the Loops deserves a mention.
posted by unmake at 4:35 PM on April 22, 2006

Blue States, which I like better than BoC.
posted by adamrice at 5:06 PM on April 22, 2006

Some of the suggestions I see above I don't agree with. While I think Mogwai and Mum are awesome I don't necessarily think someone who likes BoC would like them.

Here are a few I think you'd like though:
Dim Dim - Kiwi is insanely good
The Grace Period - Dynasty is very good and sounds a lot like mellow DJ Shadow (to me)
The Urchin
Plaid
Mouse On Mars (some of their stuff, but not others...)
Global Goon - Family Glue is amazing
Apparat
E*Rock
E*Vax (alt link)
Four Tet
The Bionaut
Melodium - Anaemia is killer
Copy

I'd also suggest checking out the label Audio Dregs. I don't like everything they put out, but I like most of it. An Audio Dregs sampler can be downloaded here.
posted by pwb503 at 7:42 PM on April 22, 2006

Might I suggest trying Pandora?
posted by dazed_one at 8:23 PM on April 22, 2006

Oops. Let's try that again;

Pandora.
posted by dazed_one at 8:24 PM on April 22, 2006

Paul Schutze
Seefeel
Steve Roach
posted by jayder at 9:31 PM on April 22, 2006

I have been listening to much Proem lately & am frequently reminded of BoC. Machine Drum might be worth checking out too, esp. as you like your Aphex also.
posted by hgws at 11:44 PM on April 22, 2006

your looking for down-tempo/ambient
try neotropic (white rabbits is the best electro album ever), pole, pete namlook, autechre (amber), aphex twin (analouge bubble bath and selected ambient works), funki porcini
posted by psychobum at 1:51 AM on April 23, 2006

also you might like the music from slabo.com (they have a grip of free albums and some nice mixtape sets)

more extreme but great electronic: venetian snares, doormouse, knifehandchop, kevin blechdom
posted by psychobum at 1:53 AM on April 23, 2006

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downtempo
posted by psychobum at 1:54 AM on April 23, 2006

Wow! Lots to look into here. You guys rock.
posted by Otis at 6:07 AM on April 23, 2006

I can't believe nobody's suggested M83.
posted by ryanhealy at 8:54 AM on April 23, 2006

I'll chime in and give a third or fourth suggestion of Four-Tet.
posted by kaseijin at 10:34 AM on April 23, 2006

the first few that come to mind that haven't yet been listed are

fizzarum
animals on wheels
cex (a little more skittish/beat heavy)
biosphere (more ambient)

here are the artists in my 'idm' folder.
funkstorung
jan jelinek
lemon jelly
marumari
matmos
monolake
morgan geist (more ambient techno)
mouse on mars
plaid
proem
safety scissors
squarepusher
venetian snares
cylob
datathief
solvent
phoenicia

and the obvious
authechre, (m)u-ziq, amon tobin


see also
dub tractor
minus 8
posted by pinto at 6:17 PM on April 23, 2006

Got here a little late, but some more suggestions for fun

Datach'i
Deadelus
Icarus
Fennesz
Fridge
Future Sounds of London
Luomo
Leafcutter John

All are worth a listen.
posted by MetaMonkey at 6:26 PM on April 23, 2006

pinto: venetian snares?
both being in your idm folder does not make them similar.
posted by juv3nal at 6:35 PM on April 23, 2006

tycho is neat btw, missed that other thread where he was mentioned.
posted by juv3nal at 6:38 PM on April 23, 2006

Kid Loco : A Grand Love Story sounds like BoC, if BoC were from our actual earth, and not the parallel high-tech divergent 1970s they seem to be from. It's still very good, though.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 9:42 PM on April 23, 2006

slag boom van loon
posted by psychobum at 2:49 AM on April 24, 2006

Thanks again everyone -- so much to look into here. That Tycho recommendation was spot on, and I missed it earlier as well. I picked up Prefuse 73 and M83 CDs today and will have a listen later. Listening to a mixtape grabbed from slabco.com right now. Look forward to getting some more stuff from there.
posted by Otis at 12:05 PM on April 24, 2006

Oh, also: BrothomStates. He sounds a bit like a lot of Warp artists, but check out mdrmx and Viimo on bleep.com. Both are lovely.

You might like Karsten Pflum, too. Here's one of his tunes used as a soundtrack to a generative music video.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 11:12 PM on April 24, 2006