An intimate portrait of heartbreak, loss, and fallout, ‘Cargo Cult’ is Sisyphes at their best. Geoffrey Papin’s project is partially a pop record, mostly veering towards the dream pop style and bringing out alternative sounds that range into far more artful pop record. Described as a “one man bedroom recording created in the glooming caves of mental illness, exploring recent solitude and heartbreak”, it’s a deeply vulnerable and revealing insight into a relationships end and the subsequent pains that fall through after.
A while back, I reviewed the album’s lead single, a hauntingly beautiful composition called ‘Au Carrefour’. The track, with its enigmatically enchanting string section has you instantly transfixed in the wonderland that the artist creates in each track. It’s in the experimental production that Sisyphes is able to really bring out his own unique artistry. On each subsequent track, he almost entirely flips his script, bringing out increasingly unique and otherworldly compositions to life. It doesn’t matter if you understand the language, the feeling is undoubtable across each piece. From the more ethereal opener to the more poppy ‘Des Stops et Des Detours’, he’s constantly innovating and reinventing his sound.
It’s perhaps on Sans Le Taire Ni L’Oter that Cargo Cult really hits its highest point, its zenith. The synth pop opening coupled with the strangely rhythmic and slow percussive makes this ballad the most engaging and imaginative of the lot. Sans Le Taire Ni L’Oter has a more light hearted energy, the kind of strangely happy energy that has you captivated through and through.
After a year that was filled with challenges, loss, heartbreak, and more, the re-emergence of Sisyphes has the project far more focused, bringing out intensely personal but soothingly poignant tracks that showcase the blunt narrative style of Papin.