Alcest

I'm enjoying this new album, but I don't quite get all the Slowdive comparisons.

"alcest are not metal theyre hipster indie" comments everywhere. anything indie or indeed non metal is "hipster" to those types btw

Is it because they're the goto reference point for anything dreamy and shoegazey?

people got bored saying MBV/Ride

I'm enjoying this new album, but I don't quite get all the Slowdive comparisons.

It helps that Neil Halstead actually sings on it...

the metal vs. not metal argument is going to turn out at least as interesting as the punk vs. not punk argument.

yeah i'm not saying it's this exhilarating argument or anything, but given the success of Deafheaven last year (and esp. last month) you can see why ppl who need to create content would write something.

then haters gotta reply and we have to suffer both!

it doesn't matter whether it's metal or not it just matters if it sucks. people not wanting to address that it sucks will write THE PURISTS ARE ANGRY! pieces because it distracts people from how this music is fuckin boring

it is boring, but in a very elegant way

it is boring, but in a very elegant way

yes. late-bourgeois metal

so does it work as ambient?
I am delighted that this band stopped having those lame Dragonlance via Vertigo comix style sleeves.

on further inspection, i'll revise that assessment to nth tier MTG card art

god the metal community has been dealing with a lot of brutal existential dilemmas, eh? Are true schizms in the metalverse even possible in the www age (diffusion of styles/lister preferences)? Metal fan community to diffusive in terms of taste? Sorry, this probably sounds hella patronizing..

people have been writing a lot of reviews/thinkpieces about that exact q, actually, that seems to be the primary function of these crossover releases - to generate "what does this mean for metal?" ruminations

it is somewhat interesting, I can't lie, that 80s/90s nostalgia as a driving force has resulted in this moment where what metal bands are nostalgic about is old Curve records instead of old Bathory records...but really nowhere near as interesting as people wanting to squabble about "purists!!" seem to think. there are way, way fewer people making purist objections than there are people basing their assessments on what the purists are purported to be thinking imo

feel like Ulver might be relevant to this discussion

probably a thread in itself as a lot of people dont like alcest so wont read this

xp

probably a thread in itself as a lot of people dont like alcest so wont read this

for my evil faux-purist purposes it's better if these discussions are relegated to threads no-one reads

Listened to this album this morning on the train. It's great. Here's the thing: I like it so much, I have no interest in exploring the band's back catalog. This album is perfect as it is; I am very happy to let it live as a shimmering, singular object without ever bothering to learn "how they got there."

what i got out of my listen yesterday was that the guitars sounded really good, there were some noticeable nods to post-rock and emo that i was into, but the package as a whole is just a little bit....lame? idk, there's a chance i come around and it becomes a record i really like. the stakes just seem a little too low atm.

re: thinkpieces and influences and all that, i'm just going to assume those are only interesting questions (as they specifically pertain to this record) to ppl who never heard the amesoeurs ep. because this sounds a lot more like that than it does any of the old alcest records.

the last song on this is gorgeous

The interesting part of the metal/not-metal question for me is whether it's possible to hear this album (assuming previous engagement with Alcest) without thinking of metal or having its metal provenance colour your experience. Can you listen to it just like you would a Curve album, where metal isn't even relevant, or is the 'not-metal' lacuna always there also? It'd be different if it constituted a complete break with an older style, but it's obviously continuous with what Alcest have done already. We aren't in some new world, it's still Neige's fairy land where black metal is part of the geography, even if this time around it's unexpressed.

diamonddave otm

The amesoeurs album was wonderful

yeah i was a big fan

I know what aerosmith is getting at earlier with a genre comparison and why people keep saying it since but the Curve mentions keep throwing me, I admit -- Curve to my mind, more so in the earlier days, are overlapping layers of guitars that just sound contemptuously angry, industrial/EBM leaning rhythms, and pissed-off/feminist lyrics coolly delivered. Shelter's way more on the agog Slowdive/Sigur Ros tip.

Ned I gotta be honest I don't really differentiate between all the NME one-word band name guitar bands of the early 90s, they're all pretty much one band to me

xpost I'm not really getting the Curve comparisons either

I'm getting a bit of a metal vibe from the new Alcest, in that it's awash in 6+ minute epics with multiple crescendos, as opposed to the noisy pop side of shoegaze. IOW, it's closer to Ride's "Dreams Burn Down" than anything resembling Slowdive.

yeah I'm getting a slight GY!BE/ASMZ vibe from this

I suppose that's the thing; it might not sound very metal but as it's a metal band making the album the approach is still gonna be that of a metal band.

love love love the Ruines Humaines EP by Amesoeurs. there is something irresistible about its looseness. it's as if the band could just one-hundred percent wig out at any second and it wouldn't matter because it would be the natural culmination of all those loose nerves anyway. the full-length was a bit manicured in its unhinged-ness by comparison. still excellent though.

Ned I gotta be honest I don't really differentiate between all the NME one-word band name guitar bands of the early 90s, they're all pretty much one band to me

first impressions of new album: pretty, but they've somehow diluted the traits of their signature sound and devolved into something that's like the happy medium of a whole bunch of other bands.

First listen and this is very pleasant. Nice, but like a lot of folks I feel something is lacking. And "Away" should never have been on here. Perfectly fine tune, but it sounds like a different project.

holy shit, this album

this is a fall-off?????? omg

YEAH Dan how dare you like it.

(My interview with Neige should be running next week.)

I'm always amazed by the "not metal" accusations and reviews (especially folk and ambient spinoff bands), but I have seen fans of other genres negatively review something for not being in the genre they expected it to be.

Why are 70s and 80s metal bands allowed to have some blatantly non metal tracks? Does anyone scream "NOT METAL!" when they hear Black Sabbath's "Fluff" or Judas Priest's "Epitaph" or any number of other lighter tracks by classic metal bands?

Then there is things like Peccatum where only a low percentage of Lost In Reverie is metal. Love that album.

i know people who hate vol iv because of changes (seen someone say it on ilm too)

did these guys always sound like The Sundays or is that a recent development

It's ironic that Sigur Ros decided last year that all this precious, pretty, shimmering candy floss was an artistical dead end, and abruptly went for something a lot meatier - exactly at the moment that the metal dudes of Alcest and Les Discrets are diving headlong into it.

I'm always amazed by the "not metal" accusations

Actually this reminds me of Hammock

an artistical dead end

naw you had it right the first time

look, I hate Sigur Ros just as much as the next right-thinking man but this blatant "I hate it when guitars sound like a wall of pretty" nonsense will not stand

Siegbran says "Don't particularly want to dress up as this strawman, but you know...it was not that crazy to have preferred Michael Jordan playing in the NBA instead of dicking around in Minor League baseball."

I'm still not sure what you mean. Surely people should pursue whatever direction they feel themless compelled to go in, especially if they are going to stagnate in what they were previously doing.

I dont know if the naysayer concensus on Alcest is whether their old metal stuff was better or that going into something associated with indie is the real transgression.

Didnt that Carcass frontman do a country album? Anyone heard it?

Didnt that Carcass frontman do a country album? Anyone heard it?

yes

not exactly a classic in its field

hahaha

I cannot speak for the naysayers but Alcest was excellent in what they did, and yes they stagnated a bit lately. This record is a logical change at this point, it's a record they needed to make. And I like it! Even though it's not as good as most of the other stuff mentioned on this thread (Ride, Slowdive, Sigur Ros, Hammock, etc). However, I'm not really interested in any more Alcest records like this. I'd rather have them explore the (pretty big) area between metal and postrock than become just another bunch of dudes with a volume pedal, delay and a reverb box.

Siegbran says "Alcest was excellent in what they did"

Do you mean the pre-Souvenirs stuff? I was under the impression they had several pure black metal albums but I just checked and saw that Souvenirs is their first album. I thought it was a backlash against a previously established metal band like Ulver.

Yeah, another fine album from them.

Alcest is somehow becoming one of my favorite bands without me noticing

New Alcest track, "L'envol". Full album out in June.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haQ_zgn9ck4

https://alcest.bandcamp.com/album/lenvol

Listening to an advance of the full album and it's a damn treat.