I have read almost everything in English there is to know about Malice Mizer and put aside my complete hatred of being wrong, and now shall attempt to explain Merveilles. These are only my thoughts on it, mind, and I am not only not part of Malice, but not even from Japan. And, now, with the disclaimer out of the way...I will be refering to the main character as "zir."

1. ~de Merveilles

It's about Merveilles, really. They were nice enough to give us this one ^^ The sounds present an image of the old fashioned town in which the story takes place, and at the end of the journey through the town you open the door to the album and enter "Merveilles." In this case it's not really French I don't think. It's more like an idealized Malice France.

2. Syunikiss ~the second lamentation~

It sounds like this picks up from where "Bel Aire the movie" left off, with zir reaching the woman he loves just as she dies for an undisclosed reason. It's most likely simply her fate to do so, and it might have had something to do with the fact that she's a witch. He attempts to resurrect her by praying to a god with the words she said before her death, and the god does. However, she has returned to life without a soul, or heart, and no longer loves or recognizes him. She simply keeps staring at the sky like she wants to be set free from her body again. Although he asks the god over and over to "return to her her heart," he can't bring her soul back. Finally, he realizes that he can never return her to the way she was and, rather than making her live in a...state where she is aware, kinda, but...um, not really half-dead...umm...well, you get the point...anyway, she's like that, and he asks the god to take her back so she can finally be at peace. It ends with him sadly beginning to bid farewell to her.

3. Bel Aire, Verte Aile ~in the void of time~

The master of time my be a reference to the Babylonian god El, who was the master of time.

For zir, time stops as he continues to hold his dead love's lifeless body. Or at least, he tries to convince himself he's stopped it. But he soon realizes that he hasn't, and is forced to acknowledge that she's escaped from the pain of living. He, however, has not, and he wonders if she even remembers him now that she's died. Suddenly zir is faced with the reality that he's alone and subject to time, which not only took his true love from him, but is also forcing him to live on without her. He begins "painting pictures" from his memories of the two of them together because part of him refuses to let himself accept she's truly dead. Some part of him knows she is though. He sees his memories of her smiling at him in the sky and reaches out to her, but this is replaced with a vision of her floating up into the sky. It forces him to recognize that she cannot come back. He's still in the field, but now he's let her go both figuratively and literally, and his mind is now of questionable health.

4. Illuminati ~it sounds sooo much like FF8, by the way~

Nimrod, aka Ninus, is the fabled king of Assyria. He is said to have attempted building the Tower of Babel in order to reach the gods, but they smote the tower down. He was also rumoured to have been married to the queen Semiramis and to have been the basis for the Babylonian war and vegitation deity, Baal. He died every fall and was ressurected in the spring like Osiris. Semiramis was maybe the basis for Ishtar/Athtart, the goddess of love and ressurection. Baal was the son of El. *He was also mentioned by Eliphas Levi, who drew the picture of the hermaphrodite in Velvet Eden's "Maze" ^^* Gackt is using them as the deities in this. Meanwhile, the Star of David represents balance and union of everything (male/female, heaven/earth. etc.). It is also rumored to be Nimrod's symbol, and the symbol of the Babylonian royalty. It was used in their sex rituals, and thought to be useful in ressurecting the dead.

The Illuminati are immortal super-beings/gods on earth. I think...it's hard to really pinpoint them as anything. I've heard that Nixon was one, after all. That's just silly. But they are into finding enlightenment through science and old devil worship hentai rituals, similar to the Baal cult ones. In fact, they are associated with ressurecting Lucifer, who's tied in with Baal. The group was rumoured to have been started in Bolivia in 1776, but even as early as 1000 in Italy *they're associated with the Masons, who are in turn associated with the Hand of Mysteries in Velvet Eden's "Maze"...^^...okey* The holy grail is immortallity, rejuvination, and sex (in Eliot at least). And the nymph Moria rejuvinated someone *...nope, not in Maze, but please go listen to Velvet Eden, ne, ne (poke)*

Sooo, the hero from Bel Aire is a bit upset about time taking his love away from him and still not quite over her yet. He has also lost faith in whatever god he was praying to at this point (El, maybe) and decides to try ressurecting his love again through the dark arts. He also wants to stop time so she will not die again. He participates in a dark ritual, sacrifices someone, and makes a pact with something evil (Baal I think). And becomes immortal because of the reference to "the Holy Grail." The line "Magical or Merriment, communion with Nimrod" eludes to the fact that these orgy rituals seem to be largely a cover up for satisfying human desires, nothing more. He doesn't know if it will work though. At this point zir is a bit insane and has managed to get himself lost - from "distorted face" and the rest of the english in the song. Now this is where the real controvercy of the song is. I personally think he ressurected his love and they both ended up immortal because it works out well with the next four songs and Transylvania. However, it could also be argued just as easily that he does not suceed, because he's still insane in Brise, and because of the line I analysed above and "Gekka no Yasoukyoku." But I'll get to that in the next section and let you decide on your own.

5. Brise

The world is falling apart as zir sits in his empty, lonely white room. Reminds me of one of Lovecraft's stories, but I don't think it's particularly relevant for interpreting the song (The Music of Erich Zann). The playing that he is doing here is child's play, not musical playing. The room itself is actually a metaphor for his mind, as Gackt said that his "image of the white room came from his time in the mental hospital." The zir is still insane and lost in the world, but then the person he loves finds him and pulls him out of it. I think it is her because she had been in the sky before, so they would both be rising up to meet each other in a place that is a half-way point between the actual and the spiritual were it her. She is unsure, however, of what to do, and he convinces her to stay. By the end she is completely real though, as the last lines of the song takes on a more realistic aspect than the rest of it had before. Her body also takes on a physical, hense seeable, quality. His prayers for her complete revival have been answered; "for the sake of this day [he] forever prayed for miracles." That's what he's been praying for since Syunikiss, after all.

However, this is where you have to wonder. In any story it is dangerous to trust the narrator, especially an insane one. It's possible that songs 5-7 all play out in his head, with his downfall occuring in "Je te Veux" and "S-Conscious" when he finally awakens. That would explain the english in "Illuminati," but doesn't fit in with the feeling I get from Gackt and Malice Mizer in general. So she has been revived.

6. Aegean ~recollections on the winds~

Zir has been abandoned, like in Transylvania. He's immortal though so this is bad. The room is the room that they shared in Brise, and he's still trapped into his past memories because time has continued on outside the room and only he hasn't changed. The reason I don't think she died again, or had to return back to being a spirit is because of the line "you, only laughing in the old films... " This, along with Ju Te Veux, would lead me to believe that she had become unhappy and left him to go do her own thing. But I should warn you; I say that because the scariest thing in the world to me is the idea of being trapped with someone you "love" for eternity. First off, I can't, and second, that would be really boring.

7. Au Revoir

Now he has freed himself from his memories and is learning to go one living as he should have before, symbolized by the recession of their steps and the whithered trees. Suddenly he notices all the things that he had been missing when he had trapped himself in his mind, like the same wind that had slipped through his fingers in Brise, and the beauty of the falling leaves. His love is figuratively dead to him, as he sees her as still being trapped inside the room while he is now outside of it and free. The whole thing has a very dream-like aspect to it, and he even recognizes it as a dream of the past when he acknowleges that all that are left are his "gentle memories." Her figure disappears, which parallels his waining dependence on her. He still loves her, but he's resigned himself to the fact that it's going to be like a pleasant dream from that time on. Literally he is waking up from his dreams and bidding her farewell in his mind.

8. Ju te Veux

Coming soon...

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~all songs copyright of Malice Mizer. Translations and ideas by me. Please give credit if you use them and email me yours ^^ Doumo~