IN FLAMES Clayman Re-recorded 2020

[Jester Slave]

I had a dream/nightmare about IF releasing Battles 2. It had ~7 songs, many sings had some additional info in ()s, and the cover was a skull, with the background shifting from black to red.

Thanks for listening.

 

[Sierota]

Yo me all of those bands sound the same. They have great technique and play fast but there's nothing that catches my attention.

Almost like 90% of American bands.

Black Dahlia come pretty close to the European MDM sound imo.

 

[eochaid]

That's why melodeath was a bit of fresh air. Even some traditional European death metal bands like Entombed had a different sound from the American bands. I don't remember liking any death metal.american band.

Yes. Is mostly about melodies.

Being impressed is difficult for me. Unless the bands come with something that's unique and outstanding. In the last decades metal is mostly about copying repeated formulas or being a bunch of posers.

 

[eochaid]

I had a dream/nightmare about IF releasing Battles 2. It had ~7 songs, many sings had some additional info in ()s, and the cover was a skull, with the background shifting from black to red.

Thanks for listening.

Isn't that the re recording of clayman?

 

[eochaid]

Black Dahlia come pretty close to the European MDM sound imo.

Still, a band that seems to be more concerned about the death than the melodic part. Or so.they sound to me.

The Americans lack the roots that European bands have. Those roots are what make me like European metal in general and melodeath in particular.

 

[DE4life]

I had a dream/nightmare about IF releasing Battles 2. It had ~7 songs, many sings had some additional info in ()s, and the cover was a skull, with the background shifting from black to red.

Thanks for listening.

Fortunately much like SC I think Battles is a one off event. For all In Flames' mistakes, and there have been a lot over the past 20 years, they rarely produce the same bad album twice. There's only one ASOP, one SC (thank god) and one Battles. I don't think they will ever release another album that sounds like any of those again.

The problem is they don't release albums that sound like their decent-sounding modernworks either. No album that sounds similar to R2R, STYE, CC or SOAPF. Every album is very different which is both good and bad. Zero continuity but it keeps things interesting, so... I don't know.

 

[eochaid]

I think that ITM is a continuation from past albums, specially with elements from soapf and SC and some from battles, but slightly more metal.

 

[drawntoblack]

Yo me all of those bands sound the same. They have great technique and play fast but there's nothing that catches my attention.

Almost like 90% of American bands.

Absolutely, this.
It's all about unnecessarily fast BPMs, clicky kick drums, soulless screaming and no melody or atmosphere whatsoever.
I don't get the hype about The Black Dahlia Murder. All of their songs are the same, they are essentially a third rate sped-up copy of the worst songs At The Gates ever put out.

 

[DE4life]

I love System probably my favourite track off Reroute with Minus very close behind in second place. It's funny how when they try to make 'heavy' songs nowadays like Everything's Gone, it sounds nowhere near as good as tracks like System or Morphing into Primal.

 

[drawntoblack]

That clean singing breakdown is one of the best moments on the entire R2R.

 

[DE4life]

That clean singing breakdown is one of the best moments on the entire R2R.

The ending of System is so epic as well. It's awesome how it builds up to a crescendo with Anders screaming like a madman, keyboards and guitars complimenting everything perfectly.

I really like how Anders' cleans sound on Reroute as a whole. He's still not a good singer (never has been, never will be) but there's a raw, genuine quality to his vocals that makes it okay. I'd take these kinds of cleans over the autotuned bullshit we get nowadays any day of the week.

 

[ThePhobiac]

New Tanner project songs are very good, imo. Lots of fun. I continue to be impressed with this guy.

 

[DE4life]

New Tanner project songs are very good, imo. Lots of fun. I continue to be impressed with this guy.

I'm interested to hear how the Anders track sounds in full. It'll arguably be the closest thing to MDM he's been involved in since Clayman, or CC at a push.

 

[ciko_gfb]

I'm interested to hear how the Anders track sounds in full. It'll arguably be the closest thing to MDM he's been involved in since Clayman, or CC at a push.

It's your lucky day, its already out.

 

[DE4life]

It's your lucky day, its already out.

Verses are a bit too metalcore for my taste. Chorus isn't the best, clean vocalist is a bit too scene sounding for me. I quite like the pre-chorus though, and the section between 2:00 - 02:30 is cool. Krofius will cream his pants when he hears dat scream from Anders @ 02:13.

Not terrible, but not great either. A fairly heavy dose of mid-2000s metalcore, some MDM sections which sound nice, and scenecore style chorus which sounds out of place to me. One slightly annoying thing I notice is that the vocals have a little too much reverb on them, there's a bit of an echo on both the growls and cleans which should be tightened up.

 

[DE4life]

From what I can make out of the lyrics Anders is screaming, there's no doubt that he wrote them

In the depths of despair
I'm calling to myself
My soul is fractured
Lost all confidence

Sinking even deeper
Lying to myself, again and again
The promise of tomorrow is just a living hell

This is the ??? I'm trying to find
The person I used to be
The truth and the lies
It's all useless now, I feel helpless
As the world is falling down

How can I ever win this race?
All the empty promises again
Searching for a reason to exist
Nothing is sacred and nothing seems real

I can hardly breathe
When your trust I will betray
So save yourself
'Cause you cannot save me

---

Can't be bothered trying to interpret one word from the pre-chorus I don't understand (feels like it should be 'meaning' but the way he says this is weird, like 'memol'), but this is fucking textbook Anders and his tortured 14 year old soul looks like leftover lyrics from ASOP.

 

[eochaid]

What about his lighthouse in the dark?

If he's trying to say something to his wife and kids then they do not get it or simply don't care .

 

[krofius]

Is that really Anders screaming during all verses? If it is he sounds fucking awesome. At first I thought it sounded like someone that sounded very similar to Anders, it's like he's slightly lower pitched and obviously with a different production. Probably the most melodeath sounding track Anders has been on in a long fucking time. Chorus was nothing special though, but some nice riffs here and there. Mostly impressed by Anders vocals tbh. I didn't cream my pants but that scream at 2:13 indeed, was very cool. That part gave me a bit of a black metal feel, don't know why.

Now, we just have to get Björn to write some faster melodic thrashier riffs. Either way, I never thought I'd hear Anders on a MDM-type track ever again so I'll take it regardless if it's a featuring guest thing.

 

[TheJestersDoor]

From a pure vocal performance standpoint Anders kills it on this, I think it's my favorite performance of his with his modern voice, he sounds almost different, it's kind of a return to the ASOP/SOAPF half scream half sing but lower pitched and it sounds fucking awesome. You won't get a performance like that in a Howard Benson produced song. Imagine I, The Mask's screamed songs were in that style, and had that overall production, I think i'd lose my mind.....

For the love of god it's clear to see In Flames just need to split from Benson, Tanner is a clearly talented drummer with a metal heart unlike christian rock Joe, and Bjorn can still write some proper metal when he puts his mind to it. Either let Chris write with the band or bring Niclas back and get him involved, go back to what used to be Studio Nordstrom / Studio IF, and do justice to the music they're making.

I listened to the track again and in the pre-chorus and bridge Anders sounds like the vocalist of Gojira. So cool I love it

 

[galvanized]

That's because you missed my first reaction to Clayman .

And yes, I also prefer American bands with European influences. I tried listening to bands like Lamb of God, with a more pure American sound, but I find them fucking boring.

From an American, Amen.

I can’t stand Pantera and all that early 90s southern metal stuff. Sounds bad to me.

But there is one brutal as fuck Lamb of God song that literally gives me chills everytime I listen. Used to listen to that one over and over back in the day.

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