It is unclear whether Quebec’s Galerie Stratique (Charles-Émile Beullac) is presenting us with a vision of the future or his interpretation of the modern desensitized world. Either way the outlook is grim. Our emotional touchstones are removed, replaced by foreign textures and reference points. There are only two truly human sounds: a man speaking woodenly in “Fièvre, 1982” and a woman singing on “Ville Engloutie“, but her voice gets buried deep in the mix. Aside from the vibraphone, the instruments themselves do not sound real. Maybe they aren’t. They could be processed field noises. That’s how alien Beullac’s landscape is.
It’s a distillation. As a representation of how removed we have become from both our spiritual selves and the organic earth, it is chilling. As a work of experimental electronica, it’s fascinating.
