Listening to him talk about the conception of mutek and the building of bridges and its definitely resonating with me. Magical is a great word despite Mr. Leclair feeling cheesy even saying it himself.
I grew up in Maine quite close to Quebec and attended university in Halifax Nova Scotia. I felt very close to Canada already and enjoyed many trips to Montreal and many other towns in Quebec.
The long form of the festival and the localist bent of it certainly made it stand out against other very "ravey" festivals more driven by drugs and consumption than by creativity, community, and special sense of a future vision. ever go to WEMF? Ok... so wemf and other "raves" have their place.... but this felt more grown up and an evolutionary expression of my generations love affair with techno. something we could show our parents and say look... this is serious and we are artists, we appreciate this as an artform and we are interested in pushing a vision for the future.
Marc has a great voice I might add, it's calming to listen to him. you can also hear a great streak of opposition in him.
cheers to the smoked meats of quebec and Marc Leclair!