Is that sound effect in my head or in the produce section? The strange decision to put sounds in Carrefour supermarkets and its effects on my subconcious
Walked into a Carrefour supermarket off the boulevard.
Out of the urban sprawl and into a nightmarish world of sounds.
First is the fish section where you can buy frozen tuna and small batons of discount crab sticks all accompanied to the sounds of bubbling water.
The desperate cry of a seagull.
The flapping of wings.
That cannot be right.
What is with these sounds I think I am hearing?
Am I in heaven?
Why do I feel like this is a dream?
Who decided that sound effects in the fish section of the supermarket was a good idea? Did the head of Carrefour supermarkets work in radio? What is with this? This could be an art installation if it was not so disturbingly coordinated with corporate produce.
.....Then onto the fowl section where I can hear sounds of wind blowing and tiny thrushes singing their sing songs. Meanwhile I am just trying to buy a roast chicken.
Strange that Carrefour did not determine that what was really needed in the frozen meat section was the sound of a rooster screaming after it has had its head chopped off. Why not carry the strategy all the way through to its logical conclusion? What's next? A fresh kill on the savana? The sound of a lion mauling a gazelle? But they have not taken the cinema of shopping this far. There is no such sounds of this kind of carnage, only strange sounds associated with the country. It's a peaceful place to hunt in which the prey does not fight back.
I can only conclude that this recent trend of providing supermarkets with a strange audio experience comes from an overzealous sound effects editor turned CEO of a multinational company. I do not exactly yearn for the days of easy listening but this sound effects experiment has got to go. It can't be working. It cannot be making people want to buy more stuff?
Can it?
Are people really buying more groceries because their ears have become adjusted to a nature documentary?
Someone might find this aural experience exciting but for me it's an LSD trip into the dark frontier of creepy shopping.
No one is going to fool me into thinking I'm catching my own fish.
No one is going to convince me that I have gone back to the era of hunter gatherer.
I've just come from the street where a bum has been pissing out the contents of his bottle of cheap rosé against a wall.
This is the Parisian supermarkets I know, not some netherworld of nature sounds coming from things that do not naturally make nature sounds.
Make it stop.
Out of the urban sprawl and into a nightmarish world of sounds.
First is the fish section where you can buy frozen tuna and small batons of discount crab sticks all accompanied to the sounds of bubbling water.
The desperate cry of a seagull.
The flapping of wings.
That cannot be right.
What is with these sounds I think I am hearing?
Am I in heaven?
Why do I feel like this is a dream?
Who decided that sound effects in the fish section of the supermarket was a good idea? Did the head of Carrefour supermarkets work in radio? What is with this? This could be an art installation if it was not so disturbingly coordinated with corporate produce.
.....Then onto the fowl section where I can hear sounds of wind blowing and tiny thrushes singing their sing songs. Meanwhile I am just trying to buy a roast chicken.
Strange that Carrefour did not determine that what was really needed in the frozen meat section was the sound of a rooster screaming after it has had its head chopped off. Why not carry the strategy all the way through to its logical conclusion? What's next? A fresh kill on the savana? The sound of a lion mauling a gazelle? But they have not taken the cinema of shopping this far. There is no such sounds of this kind of carnage, only strange sounds associated with the country. It's a peaceful place to hunt in which the prey does not fight back.
I can only conclude that this recent trend of providing supermarkets with a strange audio experience comes from an overzealous sound effects editor turned CEO of a multinational company. I do not exactly yearn for the days of easy listening but this sound effects experiment has got to go. It can't be working. It cannot be making people want to buy more stuff?
Can it?
Are people really buying more groceries because their ears have become adjusted to a nature documentary?
Someone might find this aural experience exciting but for me it's an LSD trip into the dark frontier of creepy shopping.
No one is going to fool me into thinking I'm catching my own fish.
No one is going to convince me that I have gone back to the era of hunter gatherer.
I've just come from the street where a bum has been pissing out the contents of his bottle of cheap rosé against a wall.
This is the Parisian supermarkets I know, not some netherworld of nature sounds coming from things that do not naturally make nature sounds.
Make it stop.
Comments