Gilles Gobeil

[Andrei <andrei@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I picked up the two Gilles Gobeil CDs on empreintes DIGITALes last week
and I have to say they are excellent. Some of the most satisfying
electronic music I've heard in a while. Really seamless blend of subtle
processing and all sorts of field recordings (lots of klangy sounds
and factory/machinery type sounds). Very tastefully done, never falls into
that contemporary electroacoustic trap where it's like "great, here's lots
of granular synthesis". His music seems to be guided a lot more by
his vision rather than by technology. There are actually lots of moments
in his music which remind me more of things like (David Jackman's)
Organum rather than "academic" electronic music. There's a very
"isolationist" vibe to his music.

His more recent pieces, which are featured on "... dans le silence de la
nuit ...", seem to revolve a lot more around a quiet stillness which is
upset by bursts of activity.
I was kind of surprised by "Traces" a piece from '85 on the older cd is a
great sort of old school concrete type piece with lots of jarring
juxtapositions.

I'm very happy to find that empreintes DIGITALes is proving wrong my long
held, but kind of uninformed opinion that there hasn't really been any
good academic electronic music since the 70's.
And the electrocd.com site is really great. So many audio samples to check
out. I probably wouldn't have picked up the Gobeil discs if I hadn't been
able to check out the samples on their site.

Andrei