Metal Injection scribe Nina Saeidi caught up with Alcest at Bloodstock Festival and asked them some questions for your eyes only. Read on to hear what Alcest is, has been and will be.
Could you please tell me what Alcest is?
Neige: As I used to say, for me it’s music from another world in the first sense of the dark. It’s speaking about something that is above us and is related to a personal experience I had when I was a child, a very spiritual one. And in terms of music, I don’t know, some people say it’s like shoegaze.
Some people say your music is black metal…
Neige: No no no! It has nothing to do with black metal.
Then what would you describe it as?
Neige: I don’t know – it’s a mix of many things like folk music, rock, shoegaze and a bit of metal.
What inspires you to write your lyrics and create your music, maybe not Alcest in particular but in general?
Neige: As I said most of the inspiration I get as a musician comes from this experience I had, where I had visions. Maybe also from my past life because I am quite a nostalgic person and nostalgia can be good for making music.
All of your albums each have an individual sound and tend to progress, so what can we expect from the next album?
Neige: Something very different! We are going to record at the Sigur Ros studio in Iceland and it will not be metal at all, nothing from metal. It will be extremely dreamy rock, very dreamy and very nostalgic.
We know what Alcest sounds like, but what does it look like?
Neige: I just can’t describe it, it’s above human concepts and human worlds. It’s beyond language – that’s why I want to make music, because music doesn’t need explanations. You know those people who speak about near death experiences? They say that they can’t describe it.
At this point in the highly interesting interview we were interrupted, appropriately leaving us on tenterhooks as to what Neige had to say. Alcest will be touring the UK once more in December and appearing live at several more festivals this year.
