Tomorrow's Harvest

Tomorrow's Harvest

Label(s)	Warp Records Beat Records
Catalogue No(s)	WARP257 BRC-382
Release date(s)	10 June 2013 (Europe) 11 June 2013 (United States)
Format(s)	Gatefold 2xLP CD
Running time(s)	62:07 (Original release)

Tracks

"Gemini" – 2:56
"Reach For The Dead" – 4:47
"White Cyclosa" – 3:13
"Jacquard Causeway" – 6:35
"Telepath" – 1:32
"Cold Earth" – 3:42
"Transmisiones Ferox" – 2:18
"Sick Times" – 4:16
"Collapse" – 2:49
"Palace Posy" – 4:05
"Split Your Infinities" – 4:28
"Uritual" – 1:59
"Nothing Is Real" – 3:52
"Sundown" – 2:16
"New Seeds" – 5:39
"Come To Dust" – 4:07
"Semena Mertvykh" – 3:30

Release notes

Warp

After considerable speculation since Record Store Day, we can reveal that the new album by Boards of Canada Tomorrow's Harvest will be released on Monday 10th June 2013 (Tuesday 11th June in North America) on Warp Records.

Promo video for Tomorrow's Harvest

Amazon

The idolized and enigmatic duo are back. After considerable speculation by their rabid fan base (not to mention the media following every step of the way), Boards of Canada have revealed that their new album Tomorrow's Harvest will be released on June 11 via their long time home, Warp Records. Musically, the album is somehow dark yet positive, with atmospheric dissonance and mind-bending melodic creations. ^[1]

Quotes

Mike Sandison

"The challenge with this record was crafting the tunes into a specific style and time period we want to reference. In fact it's not just the time period – we analyse the specific medium we're going for too." ^[2]

"Some tracks deliberately finish earlier than you want them to, like actual cues in older soundtracks where they've been ripped out of much longer original masters that nobody ever gets to hear." ^[2]

"There are quite a few influences on this record. Carpenter is kind of an easy reference point for most people though I'd say the main ones would be Fabio Frizzi , John Harrison and Mark Isham. We're very much into grim 70s and 80s movie soundtracks so there are maybe nods to composers such as Stefano Mainetti , Riz Ortolani, Paul Giovanni, Wendy Carlos , even Michael Nyman." ^[2]

"There's actually more use of subliminals on this record than on any previous album we've done, so we're interested to see what people will pick up on." ^[2]

""It's not post-apocalyptic so much as it is about an inevitable stage that lies in front of us. But it's better if listeners find the narrative themselves, in the titles and the sounds." ^[2]

"Our listeners seem to be really cool, savvy types of people. They didn’t let us down." ^[3]

"In the studio we still spend a huge amount of time destroying the sounds in our music, though on this record we wanted to use older electronic instruments in the kind of well-produced, precisely orchestrated ways that film composers did back in the late seventies and eighties." ^[3]

"Our listeners seem to be really cool, savvy types of people. They didn’t let us down." ^[3]

Marcus Eoin

"We're based in Scotland, although some of the early sketches on this record were done in New Zealand. We have a main studio that is literally on a farm surrounded by deer and rabbits." ^[2]

"In fact if you look again at the San Francisco skyline on the cover it's actually a ghost of the city. You're looking straight through it." ^[2]

"We've been busy in our rehearsal space lately, so never say never." ^[2]

"It’s about finding something beautiful in desolation, something draws us to the atmosphere of destroyed, abandoned places. It’s a bitter-sweet thing that we’ve always tried to achieve in our music. It seems too obvious to make music that is just purely dark, that just seems too easy and naïve." ^[3]

"I hope that it works to make the listener pause and consider where we are right now, where we’re going… I guess it’s essentially a political album, but we shouldn’t spell it all out, it’s important that the listener finds their own thing in there." ^[3]

"We were involved with the art direction and we helped devise some of the ideas but we had a really great team of people helping us to make it all happen. We really wanted to bring back a feeling of anticipation for new music that has largely been lost in recent years, mainly because of the internet." ^[3]

"We’d be making music anyway even if nobody was listening, and we’ve no intention of stopping, so this is just a continuation." ^[3]

Trivia

The cover art is the skyline of San Francisco as seen from the runway at the old Alameda Naval Air Station.
- The Alameda Naval Air Station is where the show MythBusters tests many of their myths which require a large open area or empty road longer than a mile.
- purgruv from the Twoism (messageboard) found the original source picture of the artwork. ^[4]

The 1977 Canadian film "Deadly Harvest" may have been a source of inspiration for Tomorrow's Harvest. ^[5]
The vinyl release is two discs long:
- Disc 1, side 1 includes Gemini, Reach For The Dead, White Cyclosa, Jacquard Causeway
- Disc 1, side 2 includes Telepath, Cold Earth, Transimiones Ferox, Sick Times, Collapse
- Disc 2, side 1 includes Palace Posy, Split Your Infinities, Uritual, Nothing Is Real, Sundown
- Disc 2, side 2 includes New Seeds, Come To Dust, Semena Mertvykh
One of the vinyl sleeve's images is the inverted/upside-down number 822
The number 822 may actually refer to Genesis 8:22, which states:
- "As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night shall not cease."
Another sleeve image is a broken sign with only the letter G visible. This may refer to the G of Christian/Masonic Gnosticism, which is the belief system of the revelation of God through enlightened personal experience instead of religious dogma. The revelations of both God and Satan are recurring themes in BoC's works.
According to users on Twoism, the Japanese CD release of the album says "I OVERFLOW MAN" around its rim. One anagram of this is "Owl of Minerva," which, in greek mythology, represents wisdom, and accompanies Athena, goddess of wisdom. A quote of Georg Hegel's connects true wisdom of a culture with its impending destruction.

When philosophy paints its gloomy picture then a form of life has grown old. It cannot be rejuvenated by the gloomy picture, but only understood. Only when the dusk starts to fall does the owl of Minerva spread its wings and fly.^[6]

Videos

Neil Krug

Boards of Canada posted the following three videos on their official Facebook.com page. The videos are directed by Neil Krug and feature cinematography by David Myrick.

YouTube Playlist

Vimeo Channel

Viral Marketing

Cosecha Transmisiones

Part 1: Cosecha Transmisiones.