Alcest - Souvenirs d'un autre monde (2007)

Alcest is the solo vehicle of one Neige, whom has experience with some of France’s finest and most curious underground bands, namely Peste Noir, Mortifera and Amesoeurs. As for Alcest, the band was originally formed as a trio back in 1999 and heavily focused on creating raw black metal, but soon after the bands demo release in the same year things were put on hold and Alcest became Neige’s own project. In 2005 the ‘Le Secret’ EP was released and finally in 2007 the debut album, ‘Souvenirs d'un autre monde’ was released by Prophecy Productions.

Souvenirs d'un autre monde (Memories of another world) is a conceptual album of sorts which deals with Neige’s memories of a fantasy world he created as a child. He describes it as, “A plane of existence bathed in a pearly light, beyond all terrestrial beauties, which could perhaps be described as a sort of intermediate stage; the soul would rest there between two earthly lives and would for some time be freed of the burden of incarnation.”

Musically Alcest is one of the most novel bands I’ve heard in recent years as it shows influences from black metal, shoegaze, post rock and Neige’s own matchless imagination. The feeling on this recording is both heavenly and dreamy but at the same time there is a plainly melancholic underlining within the framework of this music. The opening song, ‘Printemps emeraude’ is a good example as the song is so absolutely beautiful sounding that it makes my heartache, but as it is such a gorgeous song its hard to put it out of memory. The title track is perhaps the albums highlight since again it’s just stunning and blissful but somehow at the same time melancholic in its overall structure.

The guitars on this album generally move at a mid-pace with one guitar having a typical black metal rawness to it while another has clearly melodic riffs being played and oftentimes acoustic guitars are layered over all of this too. Neige’s vocals are all clearly sung and his voice is absolutely magnificent too. His voice has this sort of echo effect placed on it that makes is sound very surreal and feminine in character, but it really works perfectly with the music presented.

The music aside, the album also comes in a beautiful digipak with wonderful surreal forest photos in the booklet, which perhaps can help the listener visualize the world he’s created through this wondrous music.

I’ve listened to this recording under different moods, in unusual environments and under diverse levels of consciousness and each time it proves to be absolutely stunning. Above and beyond the already previously mentioned songs ever thing else on this recording is a goldmine and basically all I can say is if you crave any sort of courageous incomparably dreamy melancholic music than Alcest is surely the band to add to your musical library.