10 Lies About Hexagon Sun (INFERNO - Boards of Canada )
It's actually here, the end of the world! Or at least, the end of the world as we know it, with an indefinite limbo of uncertainty towards another Boards of Canada album. Today, a mere 2 hours ago, "Inferno" has been announced -the first LP in 13 years- what better moment to pick up the pen on a dormant investigation! It's an uncanny enough event, the announcement of a new BoC-Album, not just because of the atmosphere of restrained dread that permeates the majority of their work, or the conspiratorial unease that is radiating from the methods of their marketing; I remember it well, the rollout of Tomorrow's Harvest, fresh out of high school, sitting in my shoebox room in a low rise apartment in Warsaw, searching for clues (grasping for straws really), during the very fragmentary digital easter egg hunt for clues. I recall being the first person to find and disclose a part of the code after a split second flicker of a YouTube annotation, saying "one got fat", pointed to a well known fan-made music video of "Everything You Do Is A Balloon", which makes use of a pointedly weird bicycle safety video from 1963, where another annotation disclosed the next clue. Good thing I knew the title of the source material beforehand, so I could actually, actively be part of music history by moving the investigation forward (a small feat that has not actually made it into recorded history, or has it now?)
Back then, the new album "Tomorrow's Harvest", with it's apocalyptic undertones, seemed prescient enough for the immediate present-future and we all thought we knew what was in store for us, deemed ourselves arrived in that dreary future. What fools we were! Since, we long seem to slowly have arrived in the world "Tomorrow's Harvest" was sketching out (if not with Trumps election, or attempted insurrection, then at the latest with the Covid-Lockdown, bringing a taste of that doomsday prepper atmosphere to all of us) so the announcement of a new album, called "Inferno" no less, seems troubling.
Personally, it couldn't have come at a better time. Ever since first discovering BoC, there has been a long time where it seemed to me like their aesthetic had run it's course, and I had moved on to glitchier shores - my entire Autechre-genesis lies between then and now - but more recently that timeless audiovisual language had crept back into my headspace. Between my own childhood memories in rural north west Germany, that ostensibly boring part of Europe between wind farms, straightened agricultural plots, Frutiger-Aero-core fields and skies, and recollections of the preoccupations of my grandfather (who has an IT background) with now slightly dated computer art, reflected in the environment of my grandparents house on the one hand and the unique audiovisual language of the Boards of Canada releases, that speak of corporate and public media aesthetics, man-shaped nature, and forgotten promises of a modern future, translated from the childhood of the Sandison brothers on the other meant that the long overfamiliar body of Boards of Canada's work began taking on a life of it's own again. In some ways, this makes me feel uniquely disposed to certain sensibility towards it all, considering that their work already deals with their own memory resonating in the presence, to then have childhood memories of my own that mirror their visual language so strongly that even that resonance is paralleled in my own life. Somewhere, in that commodity aesthetic signature of BoC, I feel, are still unearthed secrets, a handwriting that has never been properly deciphered, even though every fan-made music video, or artwork seems to be sharing in that same intuitive knowledge, as if we are all collectively half-remembering a previous life.
In an effort to get closer to their methods, I wrote a speculative essay entitled "10 Lies About the Hexagon Sun Collective", appropriating their method of "conspiracy theory as creative practice". It ended up leaning into the cultish side of their work more than the mysterious surface level aesthetic lined out here, but that makes it more appropriate, since that is where "Inferno" seems to be headed too. More ecstatic faces entrapped in some nature communion séance, less highway signage and wind turbines. That part of the decryption project will have to wait. Here it is:
10 Lies About the Hexagon Sun Collective (A study in organised hauntology)
I The hexagon as the building block of the world („Turquoise Hexagon Sun“, Boards Of Canada logos, discontinued Boards Of Canada Websites)
The Hexagon Collective seems to postulate the hexagon as a geometric imprint on the natural world, a previously unappreciated building block of matter. In its quality for covering two-dimensional space, of forming a seamless texture that leaves no interstice when multiplied into a pattern, it is postulated as a form more perfect than a circle. Found in the atomic structure of graphite, in the waxen structures of beehives, or on the poles of Saturn it is the more stable, universal update to the circle. The reference to the sun as a hexagon points to a reality we are yet unable to see. The common explanation for the hexagonal shape of the pole of Saturn is that a body of liquid when a rotated at different speeds at its centre and periphery produces this shape, further pointing to the hexagon being the circles’ equivalent in a multipolar world of multiple masses. The circle would be applicable only in a unipolar world - the hexagon is it’s update for the lived in world. One could say,
what would be a perfect shape in an individualist sense - the circle, unipolar and even, is an even more perfect shape in an all-considering, collective, and constructive sense: the Hexagon, unipolar, and designed for extension towards the infinite.
The hexagon is a way to extend a perfect, unipolar shape into an endless pattern. The hexagon sun is a sun, onto which an infinite amount of multiversal suns might be attached. Indeed, from a standpoint of heliocentric mysticism, the sun might be the very starting point into those multiverses - „from one source all things depend“. The beginning is not square one, it's hexagon one!
II The hexagon sun collective is employing experimental geometry, numerology and linguistics
(Sixtyten, Triangles and Rhombuses, The Smallest Weird Number, Roygbiv, A is to B as B Is to C, Music is Math, Tears From the Compound Eye, Aquarius)
This seems like a research work in progress, not a finished transmission of indisputable insights. The hexagon, of course, is at the centre of it all. In the same vein, in certain Boards of Canada compositions, numbers are implied to have more forms and dimensions than are colloquially applied:
In the various track titles of Boards of Canada’s music, there are numerous allusions to an extended understanding not just of geometry, but numerology as well. From the rational numerical rows in „A is to B as B is to C“ and „Telepath“ to the rational row that turns into an irrational one in „Aquarius“ (further elaborated in Lie VI), to the improbable linguistics of titles like „Sixtyten“, also mirrored in the name of the Collective’s own label „Music70“ (70, or sixty-ten, is the eponymous „smallest weird number“, i.e. the smallest number where the added divisors, 1, 2, 5, 7, 10, 14 and 35, add up to number greater than 70), there seems to be an impulse to apply mathematics and linguistics in tandem to reach a multilateral approach to common fields of thought, and in fact to break, split up and transcend the limits of commonly used language, geometry and numerology alltogether.
The collective seems to be seeking a type of early life nostalgia psychotoxical enlightenment, that is part brain chemistry, part transcendental existentialism. The normally not recreatable state of being „new in a new world“ (the state of early childhood) they achieve by temporal suspension of memory, with advanced neuroplastic technology that dispenses with neurochirurgy and instead relies purely on theoretical, linguistic and idealist methods.
They have found out that that early childhood state of heightened senses, that feeling of „seeing colours“, those third-eye type epiphanies brought back by olfactory memory aren’t just memories, but instead resurfacings of an immediate event only possible in early life. Human beings are imperfect in this sense, created for the higher purpose of higher consciousness that is lost before an age of autonomous rational thought is even reached. The rest of their life is just a rarely taken chance to investigate what is no longer reachable. This purpose is separate from natural selection, it causes no selection between „enlightened“ infants and „blinded“ adults. In fact it is this state of vulnerability, before any autonomy, that allows for these enlightened states. The collective is attempting to merge these two states in the grown adult.
III they are a green energy psyop, with an agenda of de-urbanisation (In A Beautiful Place Out in the Country)
Although inconclusive, any implications made by the collective towards human societal life seem to be ones towards a decentral, anti-urban, collective way of life, akin to that of tribal society, nomadic cultures, or the kibbuz. There are references to American alternative societies such as the Branch Davidians (See Lie X), and the manifesto of Paul Watson, the founder of Sea-Shepherd, who postulated that a sustainable humanity should not live in settlements that extends 20.000 inhabitants. The sample of an Interview by Amo Bishop Roden, widow of Branch Davidian cult leader George Roden, speaks volumes: „come out and live in a religious community in a beautiful place out in the country.“
IV they are retelling eastern monotheism from a Native American perspective and are striving for a syncretism of christianity, satanism and animist beliefs. (Dawn Chorus, From One Source All Things Depend, In the Annexe, 1969, Reach For The Dead)
The track „In The Annexe“ contains the garbled sample of a voice saying „Although not a Christian, he has a great faith in humanity“, in the track „1969“ the sample returns in an altered form; here it says: „Although not a Christian, he had a great faith in human beings“. Here and elsewhere it is indicated that the collective follows no discrete belief system, and instead emphasizes the transcendental potential of belief per se, in a humanistic sense, as well as a general sensibility towards a societal purpose. The track „Gyroscope“ contains reversed samples from an unidentified „message from the Lord“, while the gyroscope itself is a symbol of balance both in christian and native american faiths. Dawn chorus, the chorus of songbirds in the early morning as a spiritual message is engrained into native american beliefs, while the word chorus, of course, also points towards Christian gospel. „Reach for the Dead“ communicates an universal impulse of humanity to communicate with the deceased beyond the veil of death.
V The Hexagon Sun Collective is postulating a course of alternative history, in which the Americas successfully resisted colonisation, at least to the point of creating autonomous modern societies existing alongside the modern states of European origins (The United States, Canada, Mexico, etc.) (Kaini Industries, Pete Standing Alone, Reach For The Dead)
One of the many alternative history narratives the Hexagon Sun Collective is helping us visualise is one in which the native americans weren’t supplanted and displaced into reservations, minimised and decimated, with no real say in the society to emerge, and instead retained autonomous statehood that survived into modernity. This is an image the modern mind is almost incapable of imagining, because no comparable society exists in our real world, and therefore an invaluable hint into the potentiality space („Möglichkeitsraum“).
VI They have pioneered non-sequitur shock-therapy which is meant to trigger responses in a subset of cognitive outliers among the audience. (Aquarius, Dandelion)
The track „Aquarius“, which has become a point of reference for many researchers of the Hexagon Sun collective, has a number of language based hints. The most central - and most jarring, besides the regular exclamations of „Orange!“, and laughing children exclaiming „yeah, that’s right“ is a female text to speech voice, calmly and steadily counting up a string of „rational“ numbers, from 1 to 36, and then suddenly, the string of numbers becomes random, 36 is followed by 44, then 68, then 27 etc., until arriving at such impossible numbers as „sixtyten“. (See lyrics page provided)
The fact that I display a shudder of unease at the moment the counting up of „rational“ numbers turns irrational makes me believe I am an initiate, receptive to the intended effect. The fact that I am born under the star sign of Aquarius also points to this, as a rare version released under the „Solid Steel Presents: Hexstatic“ compilation elaborates in an otherwise unheard sample:
„I’m referring to the time in which we live, time in an extraterrestrial sense. I’m referring to the twelve universal months, each lasting approximately 2,100 years. I’m referring to our coming from the bimillennium of Pisces, which goes from 150 BC to 1950, and which is also the sign of Christ, preceded by the sign of Aries. The era of AQUARIUS began in 1950 and will end in 4050. I’m referring, of course, to a characteristic trait of the sign: AQUARIUS gradually circumscribes the radiating force of the arts inherited in the era of Pisces. So, the artist, deprived now of every individual or public defense, limits his activity to a kind of esoteric expression, and ends up performing in fringe clubs, as a phenomenon intended for the select few.“ The voice also goes on to explain how there are more people born under the Aquarius-sign in the Rock’n’Roll hall of fame than any other sign, and how there are more people born between January 20 and February 18 altogether.
VII The Hexagon Sun Collective are preparing the arrival of a new type of human being. (Split Your Infinites, Open the Light, Under the Coke Sign)
- not an extraterrestrial one, but one with advanced sensory understanding, for whom their music will be perfect, self-evident and obsolete. Human beings that exist on an evergrowing scale of time, instead of just the present, human beings with advanced synesthesia, regarding geometry, sound and vision. A sort of „Übermensch“ that exists beyond the immediacy of western capitalist individualism.
Ultimately, the intentions of the Hexagon Sun Collective are thought to be benevolent, if aberrant. On a continent rampant with dog-eat-dog individualism, they are holding up a mirror from above, showing the potential of a communally guided public sphere. Most Boards of Canada music videos are fan made, yet they all - almost subconsciously - display the same sensibilities, the charged enigmatic power of corporate logos and idents (and on the flipside, of non-corporate logos of public institutions such as the „enlightened man“ that forms the logo of the eponymous „National Film Board of Canada“), the beauty of nature seen through a media filter. In general, in the nostalgic and charged repurposing of old modernist ideals and aesthetics, the fantastic aerodynamic forms of the Concord aeroplane, of modern wind farms, of power plants, there is an apparent effort to salvage humanities potential for utopian thought, something that is more and more lost in a post- modernity, of which we have lost the ability to dream up alternatives.
VIII Ted Kaczynsk (the UNA-Bomber) is thought to be an early apostate of the Hexagon Sun Collective.
The Una-Bomber is thought to be an disciple of the hexagon sun collective, whose methods proved too unsound for the measured, tactile and subliminal approaches they are known for. However, his motives, the sudden realisation that humanity needs to abstain from its course of technological advancement, of growth and expansion very much align. Kaczynski claimed to be part of a group called FC (freedom club), the uninspired name is thought to have been chosen to not reflect badly on the Hexagon Sun Collective, which, despite the unamicable split, he still held in high regard.
IX The Hexagon Sun Collective has turned a new generation into media- theory-savvy teenagers, test runs for the new human.
In fact, the range of „altered states of mind“ they are trying to tap into run’s neatly along the age of pop-culture, and therefore the age of the teenager. It is debatable, inhowfar the „discovery“ of the teenager runs parallel to the discovery of the child, and of childhood, which is more commonly understood as the domain of Hexagon Sun and Boards of Canada. In any case, in the unusual interest of social media- natives in „Liminal Spaces“ and concepts such as Vapor Wave, or in the charged nostalgia of early 2000 web design, such as the „Frutiger Aero“ aesthetic shows that this effort is already taking effect in the younger generations.
X The Hexagon Sun Collective is trying to save us from annihilation (Semena Mertvykh, Come To Dust, Cold Earth, Tomorrow’s Harvest)
Boards of Canada’s ultimate album shows a city skyline, viewed from afar, engulfed in some sort of bright light. An exploding nuclear warhead, or a solar flare, unclear, but in any case it hints to a catastrophic, transcendental event. The album name, „Tomorrow’s Harvest“, is taken from a store for doomsday preppers. All this is to be taken as a warning: „the end is nye“, but also: „the end is not the end“, it might be a pathway to a yet unimagined future.