Boards of Canada‘s Music Has the Right to Children stands as a quintessential cornerstone of downtempo electronic music—a seminal release that propelled the enigmatic duo of Mike Sandison and Marcus Eoin into a boundless realm of nostalgic reverie. In this edition of our [flashback] column, Anne Jackson revisits the album’s haunting landscapes, with particular focus on “Telephasic Workshop,” a track that encapsulates a paradoxical beauty: at once claustrophobic and transcendent in its sonic intricacy.
Haunting and melodic
This album has to be in the top 5 of all time for ambient electronic. If you really dig Aphex Twin‘s ambient works or Brian Eno‘s ambient tracks, then I’m sure you certainly are familiar with the Music Has The Right to Children album. But there are promising beats, for sure. This album is haunting and melodic and sticks with you for quite a while, if not for good.
My favorite track is “Telephasic Workshop.” A recurring voice enters at 0:39, possibly saying, “Ritual-Rit-Rit, Rit-Rit-Rit-Ritual.” The beats arpeggiate seemingly at random, and like a slow descent into an anxious headspace, barely intelligible voices begin to flutter through the soundscape, gradually building to a nearly claustrophobic intensity. With thirty seconds remaining, the track reaches its peak—cacophony returns, only to dissolve, leaving you with that beat once more.
Overall, the music becomes more subdued, yet somehow calmer than when you first heard it. With headphones, it’s absolutely engrossing—even 27 years after its initial release.
Music has The Right To Children is available on Warp/Skam. [Bandcamp]
