| | Full Review | Ratings (84) |
Give your Rating |
| 3.5 great | Rik VII (sound-off ratings out of 10) | September 4th 19 |
Fans of Souvenirs d'un Autre Monde will appreciate this one's similarities with Alcest's earlier, rawer sound. There's a bunch too many generic riffs for it to completely unfold, but the atmosphere and general feel are lovely and her vocals are beautiful (cleans and screams alike). There's still a lot of potential to unpack once she finds a way to write more inspiring riffs, but this is a step in the right direction. - 6.5
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| 3.5 great | Benjamin Kuettel EMERITUS | December 15th 16 |
Wistful is an album that develops beautifully throughout. The angelic vocal layers are a huge strength, making for a meditative listening experience despite some of the bombast. Neige from Alcest is behind the instrumentation, lending this to feel almost like a companion album to his band. Highly recommended for fans of Alcest, and of atmospheric music in general.
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| 2.5 average | zaruyache | November 10th 16 |
This is leaps and bounds ahead of what Myrkur tried to do, but even then it's kind of... I don't rknow, directionless? There are never any "wow" moments, or anything particularly noteworthy in rterms of quality here. This is basically a female-fronted Alcest ripoff that comes not only with ruber clean reverby twinkle guitars, but also a very noticeably Neige-esque approach to singing--rboth the clean vocals and harsh vocals reek of Neigism. While that does make Sylvaine's harsh rvocals interesting (she pretty effectively copies Neige's banshee shriek), they're not good r*enough* to really help the music be any more interesting. rI mean this is OK but I'm haven't been too big on Kodama this year either, so maybe this rtwinklegaze is just wearing off me idk.
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| 4.0 excellent | Jared Floryan | May 20th 16 |
Psychic nosebleeds might be anticipated as the curtain opens up for Oslo native Sylvaine. The Norwegian nymph's 2016 full-length album is quite spiritual from a stylistic perspective and also a bit on the sagacious side. Post-rock and shoegazing traces alongside a shameless atmospheric flavor permeate Wistful in all its glory - and whilst this fusion of sounds isn't relatively unheard of, the genres that the studio effort encompass are certainly executed in a succinct manner. It's great background music and it's also a neat catalyst for waterbeds at the end of the night, with Sylvaine's mostly angelic vocals helping more than hindering.
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| 3.0 good | Steev | May 8th 16 |
As perfectly passable (and on many occasions, hypnotic) as Sylvaine's vocals can be, the rest of
the mix never really manages to come close to being able to mirror their effectiveness, and I
found myself bored with this about three or four tracks in. There's still enjoyment to be had if
you're a fan of primarily vocal 'metal' albums but don't expect to have your mind blown... or to
stay awake for longer than 20 minutes.
Bump |
| 3.0 good | LudJ | April 2nd 24 |
| 3.5 great | arf | March 19th 22 |
| 3.5 great | JoneHK | December 6th 21 |
| 3.5 great | Suyan | February 27th 20 |
| 3.5 great | kleggi | January 23rd 20 |
| 4.0 excellent | Jeejee | January 20th 20 |
| 3.5 great | VikkiH | January 3rd 20 |
| 4.0 excellent | Krpa | April 25th 19 |
| 3.5 great | kevbogz | February 26th 19 |
| 4.0 excellent | SuzyC | February 5th 19 |
| 3.0 good | bmelt CONTRIBUTOR | September 13th 18 |
| 4.0 excellent | madtwoo | April 5th 18 |
| 4.0 excellent | emmny | April 10th 17 |
| 2.5 average | hadriel | February 11th 17 |
| 2.5 average | jtswope | November 15th 16 |
| 3.0 good | Trey STAFF | May 24th 16 |
| 4.0 excellent | hsb | May 20th 16 |
| 4.0 excellent | Dmax28 | May 8th 16 |
| 4.0 excellent | Shogun | May 7th 16 |
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