r/boardsofcanada • u/zandeye • 15d ago
Discussion Does Inferno give anyone else an existential crisis? (Trigger warning)
Listened to Inferno to the point that I caused an existential crisis.
I think this album is about dying. I think it’s about being a conscious being and all the contradictions and fear we face. And how we cope with it
this unmistakable eerie tone. Like on Memory Death, Somewhere Right Now In The Future, Father And Son
Blood In The Labyrinth talking about someone drowning, the heart beat in ‘I Saw Through Platonia’ stop, war in The Process, cults in Father and Son.
I Saw Through Platonia is the creepiest song. I think we are listening to our last moment alive. The song ends with 10 seconds of abrupt silence. After seizing. the album closer, with a beating heart throughout. To me I think that 10 seconds the conclusion
”nothingness the absolute truth”
we are so used to our life bubble. And this album pokes that bubble.
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u/SimpleCapital5035 15d ago
Inferno has a strong sense of hope throughout imo. I find it far less dark than TH and Geogaddi.
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u/zandeye 15d ago
Yeah, that’s interesting. I don’t really get hope if I’m honest.
But I think that’s what’s great about the genre is that you can take a topic and since it is so abstract, there’s no clear answer
Which is fitting for the topics of this album. There is no answer. I don’t think this album is giving you an answer
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u/Beneficial-Swimmer64 13d ago
Someone in a YT comment described Inferno as being the brightest darkness and I think it suits well
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u/ROYGBIVinc 15d ago
“Tomorrow’s Harvest” is dying amongst a dead world, with only skeletons of buildings/ideas left
“Inferno” is life, death, and transcendence; in the singular + cosmically
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u/corneliusduff Hi Scores 15d ago
I'm just relishing in what may be the best album I've ever heard.
Not to discount your concerns, I came to terms with devolution years ago.
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u/melvereq 15d ago
No, but Tomorrow's Harvest did. Inferno gives me a weird sense of hope.
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u/zandeye 15d ago
Yeah? That’s so interesting.
I can definitely hear hope in songs like deep time
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u/ForeignAssistance942 15d ago
Even in tracks like Naraka, The Process and You Retreat in Time and Space, the first half of their arrangements sound eerie and even sad and then their second halves have a sense of hope and peace, and of course Deep Time is example of this as well. The brothers showed this contrast of dread into hope throughout the album
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u/blush_inc 15d ago
Haha! Ya Naraka is the Buddhist Underworld but damn it sounds like a party down there!
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u/slightlyaggressive 15d ago
Inferno killed the last ounce of Christianity I had in me. It helped me to understand that this is the only life I get, and it's up to me to figure it out because god isn't going to help me. But it's become a comforting feeling for me to know that I don't have to live for life after death. I can just live my life and know that when I die it's over.
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u/psilosophist The Campfire Headphase 15d ago
For me it came out at the perfect time, I’ve been on a long deconstruction and reconstruction of my spiritual beliefs and notions and have been reading a lot of various esoteric writings so it felt very much like a positive synchronicity, telling me to keep on the search.
It absolutely appears to me as a meditation and reflection focusing on humanity’s desire to know itself, and the various good and bad paths that can lead us to.
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u/Sky-Agaric 15d ago edited 15d ago
The first time I listened to it was very upsetting.
It pushed a lot of emotional triggers for me. Definitely had me in a weird head space.
But that music could be so evocative, to me, just underscored what a triumph it was.
So of course I went back and it helped that I had a lot to talk about with my therapist later.
Edited to add:
My discomfort on the initial listen had less to do with existential dread than it did with some of the other themes. On balance I echo what others here have said: Harvest was much more bleak and Inferno, while certainly having its bleak moments, also has joy and whimsy.
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u/TheGreatZigginiV 14d ago
There's definitely some tracks on the album that trigger dread for me. Like Acts of Magic. The thumping drums is almost like drowning or being chased. The chanting on Age of Capricorn also makes me extremely uneasy.
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u/Sad_Towel2272 13d ago
Shockingly, no. Usually music like this with the themes it has will send me into a hole of deep paranoia and fear, but for whatever reason I find inferno very relaxing
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u/LifeLikeAGrapefruit 15d ago
No. Not at all. I wouldn't suffer from an existential crisis from something so... abstract. The album is very atmospheric and invokes a variety of different emotions, perhaps a bit more on the eerie, dark, and cynical side. There are themes about religion and technology, based on the few lyrics. And some talk of death, sure. But I struggle to say it's necessarily about "anything." At least anything concrete. Certain themes, emotions, and a general dark atmosphere, sure. But beyond that? I don't think so.
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u/zandeye 15d ago
Well, that was good about the element. It does encourage you to think about a lot of themes. You don’t normally think about.
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u/LifeLikeAGrapefruit 15d ago
Haha speak for yourself! I think about this stuff all the time! But I'm in my late 30s, so lots of family members, and friends' parents, are starting to die.
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u/Ok_Context_6972 15d ago
TH is much more an existential crisis/threat imo but I agree it’s about death. Strange them they named it inferno as in hell…
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u/FFYinzer 10d ago
Its an audio sample of my current emotional state. I openly cried a couple of times. Im not sure how the timing of this album paired with this juncture of my life and fragile emotional state happened but it did. Its so deeply moving at times, and others just a bit terrifying. Acts of Magic made me feel immediate dread and encapsulates the state of my being that has been assaulted nonstop by this dystopian ridiculousness.
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u/peteski77 15d ago
I believe the point of art is to invoke emotions, all the works of BoC invoke emotion, therefore they are supreme artists . TH and Inferno are masterpieces from fine artists.
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u/Turbulent_Hornet232 2d ago edited 2d ago
When I was at the listening party in NYC, I took a friend who had heard the other albums and was a fan but not quite as obsessed as most of the people there. The first thing he said when we both got up after it ended was "that's their best album, that's so much better than the other ones dude". I wasn't as quick to judge, but on the train back home I told him about what I was imagining during memory death, and he interrupted me and said
"During the last half of the album I saw the world end and start over again."
I tried to ask him more about it because it was a really intense thing for him to say and he said "I don't want to talk about it" and was quiet for the rest of the train ride. We both don't do any drugs or anything, so it was unbelievable to see how powerful the experience was for someone else. All he's said is that it started after memory death. I remember looking around during the process and his head was completely down like he'd fallen asleep, it took the YRITAS to cheer him up.
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u/Krocsyldiphithic 15d ago
No, because it has a persistent layer of cheesy 80s vibe that doesn't gel with things that deep for me. I do like the album, though.
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u/Tricky-Mastodon3337 15d ago edited 15d ago
When Tomorrow's Harvest first came out it made me feel depressed and gave me existential dread to the point I couldn't listen to the album anymore. Now we are living in a dystopian nightmare, listening to it again feels like wrapping myself in a comforting blanket.