Boards of Canada
Dayvan Cowboy (Melissa Olson Music Videoclip)

THE REVIEW

Melissa Olson (Can): "Videoclip" of "Dayvan Cowboy", Boards of Canada (UK) from "The Campfire Headphase" (2005)

All around you there is only emptiness: 100,000 feet separate you from that blue and white sphere you see down there. We don't know who you are, we don't know where you come from, we don't know what you are thinking... now, as you throw yourself at the speed of sound and vibrate in the atmosphere. As you see the clouds, perhaps you feel that they will stop you, like a soft pillow, but instead, you pass through them: to welcome you is the hard surface of the ocean. The transition from an infinite to an immense would depress anyone, but not you: you begin to face the waves... until you see the sun set, at the end.

The feeling of vulnerability conveyed by the song is reproduced by the images: a demonstration of weakness that is not, however, a suppine acceptance. Although we will never know the thoughts of that man, faced with infinite space, we know very well that his leap is a move beyond the fears of us poor mortals... and while his descent obeys gravitational laws, as he passes through the clouds, the cosmic sounds that until that moment echoed solitarily inside him, are accompanied by the much more concrete melodic part: made of sun, sky, and sea. A conclusion that is not a conclusion: will he continue to float, or will he head for solid ground? 

Perhaps we shouldn’t even ask ourselves, perhaps we know but we will never tell you.

The video was made by assembling images from the Excelsior Project and other archive footage of surfer Laird Hamilton.