As a new fan of alcest this is my first album by them. I got the album when I seen it for a good price from the local hmv.
When I got it home I was expecting it to be much more black metal with the heavy scream like vocals you get on a black metal album. I was surprised by this album the vocals in French are not heavy there soft and more upbeat with the music. The songs are more slow and soft to start gradually getting heavy. The vocals as I have said are more clean and soft which fits better with the album. to me this is not black metal as I was told they where its more of a mix between post metal and a small amount of black metal with some off the guitar. Some songs the vocal are more like sigur ros as it's more like an instrument than a vocal. The album also get heavier as it goes on the softer songs are at the beginning then the vocals get more traditional black metal and the guitar is harder. But there are still sections in the songs of clean vocals. To me this was like when I first got the black metal album monument to times end by twilight. The songs are longer than a few black metal bands I know and there is a bit of change as the go on.
The artwork on this album is different to many black metal bands as its a nice image of a peacock in an archway with its tail getting larger and its mainly green. And it has the gold text a very nice cover and nor actually bleak like some albums artwork where its normally bleak looking forests or someone in the black and white makeup on or satanic.
This album is a shock to me and it is amazing.