Fractals and Fibonacci in Boards of Canada

[Bertolt Brechtakt]

BOC repeatedly mentioned that sometimes they compose melodies or enture tracks using the Fibonacci sequence or fractals or other mathematical frameworks.

I've been researching for some examples on this in their music but couldn't find anything yet. I know that some tracks / albums follow a very symmetric design, i.e. a palindrome. But in regards to Fibonacci and fractals I can't it in their music.

Can you name a few examples?

[KovalainenFanBoy]

if you count the years it's been since the last BoC release you get the average BoC theorist's IQ

[chronical]

Just now, KovalainenFanBoy said:

if you count the years it's been since the last BoC release you get the average BoC theorist's IQ

... He theorizes!

[YangYing]

2 hours ago, Bertolt Brechtakt said:

BOC repeatedly mentioned that sometimes they compose melodies or enture tracks using the Fibonacci sequence or fractals or other mathematical frameworks.

I've been researching for some examples on this in their music but couldn't find anything yet. I know that some tracks / albums follow a very symmetric design, i.e. a palindrome. But in regards to Fibonacci and fractals I can't it in their music.

Can you name a few examples?

 melody here follows a fibonacci pattern

[Himelstein]

7 hours ago, MIXL2 said:

 melody here follows a fibonacci pattern

Very cool- I always wondered about that one- for some reason I assumed they would be doing it with rate changes like lfo, amplitude etc. in their longer tracks. Making it more difficult to figure out. I never even thought about the actual riffs in their little diddys. Awesome that u pointed this out!

[YangYing]

4 hours ago, Himelstein said:

Awesome that u pointed this out!

Np!

I only found one mention of Fibonacci in bocpages:

Quote

On the track "The Devil Is In The Details", for example, a slowed-down female voice can be heard speaking in self-hynosis, accompanied by what at first sounds like snatches of singing, but then turns out to be a child screaming in despair. Furthermore, there is a riff in the piece that Fibonacci's Golden Ratio serves as the compositional basis for.

 

edit: more info here

Edited January 10, 2022 by MIXL2

[jules]

TCH came out in 05 which is a fibonacci number. TH came out in 13 which is also a fibonacci number. Obviously skipping 08 on purpose to create a clear pattern. 2034 imminence confirmed. 

[fizzkinz]

On 1/9/2022 at 8:23 AM, MIXL2 said:

 melody here follows a fibonacci pattern

Could someone perhaps explain how this follows a Fibonacci pattern?

im sure I’m just being dumb

numerically I understand what the Fibonacci sequence is, but I fail to hear anything in that song which sounds like 1,1,3,5,8,13,etc 

[Dragon]

17 hours ago, jules said:

TCH came out in 05 which is a fibonacci number. TH came out in 13 which is also a fibonacci number. Obviously skipping 08 on purpose to create a clear pattern. 2034 imminence confirmed. 

Catalog 3 was released in 1989

public release in 2144 confirmed

[YangYing]

8 hours ago, fizzkinz said:

On 1/9/2022 at 3:23 PM, MIXL2 said:

 melody here follows a fibonacci pattern

Could someone perhaps explain how this follows a Fibonacci pattern?

im sure I’m just being dumb

numerically I understand what the Fibonacci sequence is, but I fail to hear anything in that song which sounds like 1,1,3,5,8,13,etc 

it's the space between the notes in the melody

if u think of a bouncing ball but in reverse which also follows the same pattern

it first slows down then speeds up then slows down again everytime doing so following the pattern

[Bertolt Brechtakt]

Thank you @MIXL2. I will check both tracks out. Do you know of any other?

@KovalainenFanBoy this is actually less about being a theorist. BoC themselves spoke about using maths in their music quite a few times. Since I am neither a mathematician nor a musician, I just want to figure out where I can actually hear this.

Edited January 14, 2022 by Bertolt Brechtakt
wrong spelling

[YangYing]

On 1/14/2022 at 10:37 AM, Bertolt Brechtakt said:

Thank you @MIXL2. I will check both tracks out. Do you know of any other?

@KovalainenFanBoy this is actually less about being a theorist. BoC themselves spoke about using maths in their music quite a few times. Since I am neither a mathematician nor a musician, I just want to figure out where I can actually hear this.

Sadly I haven't been able to find more examples other than simple ones like the one below.. I'm sure more subtle mathematical ideas have been used in the creation of their music..

More trivia than use of mathematical formulas is the track " The Smallest Weird Number" this refers to the number 70 as you may know.. but also despite the track being 1:17 seconds the melody stops at exactly 1:10 (70 seconds) 

 

Edited February 5, 2022 by MIXL2