In Flames and Dark Tranquillity - bands going in opposite directions?

[Opethfan1980]

"Reroute to Remain," love it or hate it (and I'm guessing 90% of the people here hate it) is certainly not the In Flames of old. It has much more focus on clean vocals, and isolated power chords than older In Flames. While it still retains some of the sound that made In Flames one of the pioneers of melodic death, it is decidedly more simplistic, and chorus oriented than their older stuff.


"Damage Done" for the most part is Dark Tranquillity returning to their roots. While some songs contain more modern elements of melodic death (the chorus heavy "Format C: For Cortex," for example), the album is generally a step back in DT's evolution.



What do you think of the direction these two bands are going? Is In Flames selling out? Evolving? Is Dark Tranquillity staying true? Showing a lack of creativity?


Personally, there are a few songs on R2R that I enjoy, but "Damage Done," while not really bringing anything new to the table, is a great album. The riffs are dynamite, and their isn't a bad track in the bunch.


So, what do you guys think?

 

[J.]

Dark Tranquillity needs to keep doing what they are doing. They can do no wrong.

In Flames need to ditch Anders Friden and bring back Henke Forss

 

[Belial]

In Flames needs to seriously dump Anders or whoever is responcible for the path they are going. Reroute To Remain is so simple that it's boring.

 

[Belial]

To clarify, R2R would be so much better if they're put some effort into it. The concept behind it is a good one and an idea I expected from In Flames after Clayman. However, their execution was bad and the album suffers.

Firstly, they should have locked Anders in a closet and not let him get anywhere near the mic until he improved his clean voice. Second, they should have added some actual melody into the songs. There are SO MANY places that I think could have been really killer with a solo or some shredding or guitar harmonies. I really liked that guitar solo in Transparent and would have liked more of it. The vocal harmonies are the better part of the album and Anders manages to pull it off well with his... whatever you call that vox of his. Even his bad singing sounds really good in places. It's obvious they knew all this and decided to rely on the vocal harmonies as a "hook" of sorts. This may have worked out fine if they had included more things in their music to get people's attention (like actual melody).

In Flames has changed a lot from Jester Race and Whoracle. Change is a good thing. I saw a concept in Colony and actually enjoyed seeing that concept furthered in Clayman. However they seem to have made an error with their changes this time. I respect that they are a changing band trying to find a new style to call their own, but I think it was a serious mistake to abandon their melodic roots, especially since they are so good at doing melody. It's disappointing.

 

[Demonspell]

Yes, Dark Tranquility is successfully progressing in an exciting new direction. In Flames, on the other hand...

 

[Misanthrope]

Projector was a new direction.
Haven was a new direction
Damage Done only has new and old elements, but it is not however a new direction.

Its ok i mean there were not mayor new directions from gallery to minds eye either, lets just hope history repeats itself and that we get to see another mellow album

 

[SentencedToBurn]

with dark tranquillity i liked haven the best and the new one seems ok for now but i havent given it a good listen. i only listened to it at a friends for now.
The new In Flames in fantastic. there is melody all over the place in that album so people who say that it doesnt are obviously not giving it a good listen. its got some really great songs on the album. there are really only 2 or 3 that i dont like on the album. Change is for the most part good when it comes to bands. you cant stay the same forever.... people evolve, music evolves.

 

[blakmetalemp]

I wanna hear some of DT's new cd. Any song samples anywhere? As for In Flames, Ive listened and listened and its just not clicking with me. Oh well so much more new music to listen to anyway.

 

[Misanthrope]

Hours passed in exile
White noise black silence
format c: for cortex

are what i consider the highlights of the album

 

[PrinnyD00d]

This doesn't really answer your question, and it's been mentioned before, but I felt some strange impulse to mention it here. It seems like the direction In Flames is taking is similar to that of Soilwork. I really think that Soilwork executed it much better, though. I mean, I like the new In Flames album and all (I was actually pretty pleased when I heard some of the songs live), but it's not as classic as their older albums (of course).

 

[Heliologue]

i rather like the new in flames. sure, it's more simple, but so was the new Pain Of Salvation, and that's still a masterpiece.

 

[MacMoney]

"Reroute to Remain," love it or hate it (and I'm guessing 90% of the people here hate it) is certainly not the In Flames of old. It has much more focus on clean vocals, and isolated power chords than older In Flames. While it still retains some of the sound that made In Flames one of the pioneers of melodic death, it is decidedly more simplistic, and chorus oriented than their older stuff.

In Flames never were the pioneers of Gothenburg metal. Well, perhaps their music was/is more popular than other bands, but that doesn't make them a pioneer. The fact is, they've always been more or less a clone.

 

[Opethfan1980]

A clone of who?

 

[J.]

Originally posted by Opethfan1980
A clone of who?

Eucharist.

 

[MadTinus]

Originally posted by Opethfan1980
"Damage Done" for the most part is Dark Tranquillity returning to their roots. While some songs contain more modern elements of melodic death (the chorus heavy "Format C: For Cortex," for example), the album is generally a step back in DT's evolution.

I definitely don't think it's a step back in DT's evolution, there's definitely evolution from Haven to DD. They mixed some of The Mind's I with a little flavour of Haven here and there. But then, there aren't really all-new elements on Damage Done, so in that aspect you might be right, but I would definitely not call it a step back.

But I agree with most here that I definitely prefer the DT of today over the IF of today, I haven't heard R2R yet, but I wasn't too psyched about Clayman (to say the least...), so my expectations for R2R have reached subzero levels in the meantime...

Someone drew a comparison between IF and Soilwork, a striking one indeed. They both evolved from a more aggressive style to a more accesible style, IF just became weaker, but Soilwork managed to keep up the quality of their music. I mean, just compare Friden's (clean) vocals to those of Strid, Strid fucking slays Anders!

 

[MadTinus]

Originally posted by Dreamlord
Eucharist.

??? You think so...?

 

[speed]

What about Soilworks latest boring nu-metalish release- or Hypocrisy, or even the very slow and less complex new Meshuggah album? It seems every big Swedish band except for Dark Tranquility, has recently sold out. I guess these guys are tired of not making any money- but the boring music these bands have recently put out, is a disgrace to the whole scene.

 

[J.]

Originally posted by MadTinus

??? You think so...?

I definitely see similarities between (old) In Flames and Eucharist

 

[SentencedToBurn]

"What about Soilworks latest boring nu-metalish release- or Hypocrisy, or even the very slow and less complex new Meshuggah album? It seems every big Swedish band except for Dark Tranquility, has recently sold out. I guess these guys are tired of not making any money- but the boring music these bands have recently put out, is a disgrace to the whole scene."

Nu metal releases??? gimme a fuckin break man. These arent nu metal. i hate people who hear a riff that maybe is the most technical thing and then they just totally disregard the beauty of the music and call it nu metal.. cmon

 

[Opethfan1980]

Originally posted by speed
What about Soilworks latest boring nu-metalish release- or Hypocrisy, or even the very slow and less complex new Meshuggah album? It seems every big Swedish band except for Dark Tranquility, has recently sold out. I guess these guys are tired of not making any money- but the boring music these bands have recently put out, is a disgrace to the whole scene.

Sold out my fucking ass. The scene has changed over the years, and there is alot of diversity in it now. Just because a band decides to use clean vocals doesn't mean they have sold out to the highest bidder. Jesus. Fucking elitists.