Des Esseintes - Les Diaboliques mp3 album

The woman may be a complex riddle, but everything about her can be solved in one way; the child. The man, thus, is merely a means to this end. The man, on the other hand, sees the woman as his most precious and dangerous toy. This we learn from the short monologue (held in Swedish by a young Katarina Flakierska) opening the album. It begins what I suppose is a journey into the dark and twisted caverns of the female psyche, inspired by the words of "Les Diaboliques" a set of short stories by Barbey d'Aurevilly published in 1874. We are greeted with both genre-typical rumbling and industrial ambience as well as more percussive and rhythmic industrial segments creating quite the varied soundscape. It truly shines in places, plods on in between but never gets dull or boring to listen to.The experience is cheapened somewhat by the subpar digipak artwork. Had I not known the Des Esseintes project from before I'm pretty sure I would have given this album a miss, and I expect part of its intended audience may filter it away at first glance for the same reason I did. If you've enjoyed Magnus' work in the past though it is a safe buy, and for the curious mind I'd say go for it as well.