Alcest

Alcest - that is music from another world, a world that is real, but that exists beyond ours and cannot be grasped by our senses. A world where all appearances - trees, glades, streams - emit a pearly light and where a faraway and celestial music fills the air like sweet perfume. A world inhabited by infinitely benevolent and protective beings of light, communicating in a wordless 'language' directly from one soul to another. A world where the soul knows neither pain nor sickness nor sorrow, but is filled with a deep peace and an ineffable bliss. A world that lies 'before' and 'after,' 'beside' and 'behind' our world and the awareness of which stills mankind's fears of death.

This world is no dream and no fantasy. Neige, the creative mind of Alcest, knows it - he has experienced it and keeps memories of how it revealed itself to him in the form of esoteric experiences in his early life. Alcest is his medium to come to terms with these memories and to share them with others.

"Les voyages de l'âme" ("The Journeys of the Soul") is Alcest's third album and contains the quintessence of the group's creative work to date. While "Le secret," the debut EP from 2005, was the key to the world of Alcest, "Les voyages ..." unites everything that characterises Alcest in terms of concept and music. While an epic composition such as "Là où naissent les couleurs nouvelles" would have found its place also on "Écailles de lune," "Beings of Light" with its blazing character reminds of the ground-breaking "Le secret." On the other hand, "Autre temps" - the album's first single to which there is also an impressive and visually stunning video clip - is a prime example for the melodic and catchy side of Alcest that initially came to the fore on the band's debut album "Souvenirs d'un autre monde." Something that is common to all of the songs, however, is the predominant feeling of euphoria and bliss, always subtly overshadowed by melancholia and yearning. A feeling akin to that which you experience when you think about the otherworld of Alcest that awaits us all.