IN FLAMES new album being released on 1st March, 2019

[DE4life]

Welcome.

very kind of you to give them the benefit of the doubt on Clayman and COVID. Unfortunately I really don’t think COVID affected it. They purposely went with a mastering engineer who became famous for optimizing recordings for small speakers. Like radios and phones. The complete opposite of what Clayman is known for. I don’t know what they were thinking, even Bjorn seemed subtly embarrassed during interviews because he kept repeating the same talking points. I think they were forced at knifepoint. Anders’ knife.

I asked Tanner whether COVID had any impact on the Clayman remaster and he said basically no, it would have been the same regardless.

 

[Daniel_36]

Welcome.

very kind of you to give them the benefit of the doubt on Clayman and COVID. Unfortunately I really don’t think COVID affected it. They purposely went with a mastering engineer who became famous for optimizing recordings for small speakers. Like radios and phones. The complete opposite of what Clayman is known for. I don’t know what they were thinking, even Bjorn seemed subtly embarrassed during interviews because he kept repeating the same talking points. I think they were forced at knifepoint. Anders’ knife.

Oh I thought the terrible sound may have been because of Covid but it's a pity to hear that it was meant to sound that way. I listened to the re-recorded version of Only For The Weak again today and it's still as bad as I remembered it. It's the first song that I heard from In Flames so it's a shame they thought they needed it to butcher it like that.

The video is not bad though.

 

[Daniel_36]

I asked Tanner whether COVID had any impact on the Clayman remaster and he said basically no, it would have been the same regardless.

Even with its flaws I think I, the Mask sounds 1000 times better than the Clayman remaster. Completely unnecessary and it seems they don't care about their history and their legacy. Sad.

 

[DE4life]

Yeah, the Clayman remaster is total garbage. Every rerecorded song sounds a thousand times worse than the original. Literally like a bunch of shitty amateurs tried to cover the songs. Meanwhile I can't even hear the difference between the remastered songs and the originals. It's up there with that disgusting covers EP as one of the worst things they've ever released. Battles has more fucking merit than the Clayman remaster.

 

[galvanized]

Clayman remaster is better than the Down Wicked EP, I wish I could forget that exists again.

 

[ThePhobiac]

Down Wicked EP > Battles. It's not even close imo. Better production, and considering how much influence Depeche had on bands like IF and DT, 80's pop covers are actually closer to the In Flames sound than Battles is.

I'd be totally fine with the Clayman EP if the production wasn't so weak. But IF has been suffering from bad production since ASOP (well, arguably since R2R if you don't care for CC's production either) so it's hard to get myself worked up over it.

 

[galvanized]

Down Wicked EP > Battles. It's not even close imo. Better production, and considering how much influence Depeche had on bands like IF and DT, 80's pop covers are actually closer to the In Flames sound than Battles is.

I'd be totally fine with the Clayman EP if the production wasn't so weak. But IF has been suffering from bad production since ASOP (well, arguably since R2R if you don't care for CC's production either) so it's hard to get myself worked up over it.

The production might be technically better, but the EP is like the worst elements of Battles condensed into 4 songs. The vocals are the worst and the most annoying I have ever heard from IF. They made it sound like these guys:


Consider that when that music video was being recorded Anders was touring the world sounding like a total animal (and blowing his voice out in the process... but still...).

 

[eochaid]

At this point, I don't think that it really matters. Better production... Worse production... They don't have that much influence on the EP, Battles or Clayman re-recordings.

They are shit by their own merits, not because of some external factor. Even if the production was outstanding, the best ever, an orgy of sound and epicness, those recordings would still be shit. Because that's how they did them. Shit.

 

[DE4life]

Yep. Battles and the EP could have Clayman production and they'd still be garbage.

There are IF albums that could benefit from better production - mainly between 2002 and 2008.

R2R - remove the muddiness and bring the guitar leads to the front (also make Anders' voice less robotic).

STYE - get rid of the flat sound mix and make it more vbrant and punchy. Basically make the songs sound like they do on Used and Abused.

ASOP - get rid of the weak, fuzzy guitar sound and make it far more sharp and powerful. Completely redo vocals and lyrics.

 

[Daniel_36]

I had forgotten about the Down Wicked EP. I think it's completely unnecessary to be honest, but after listening again it would have been way better with no vocals, just instrumental. Some of the parts are not bad I guess and the atmosphere in some of the music it was not bad as I remembered.

But the moment Anders starts doing his thing it's completely ruined for me.

The only other positive I see is that with the EP they are ruining the songs of other artists and not theirs I guess.

 

[eochaid]

I love Down in a Hole. The original. Their version is complete garbage. It looks like a band covering Depeche Mode covering Alice in Chains.

 

[ciko_gfb]

I don't really get the hate for Clayman re-record at all. Some moments of the new recordings sounds better to me than the original. I can say about this specially for the vocals. A clear sound, a few improvements to the songs is something I like. And when they play those songs live (before covid of course) it sounds exactly what they're played on EP and we all know how they perform live. (A hint, awesome.)

Down Wicked EP is somethings completely different which kinda feels like a fresh air for me. It's No Good is awesome and I listen it every now and then when it comes up on my playlist.

 

[eochaid]

Of course you don't. And no one here is surprised at all.

It's just that your taste is on pair with Anders' singing abilities.

 

[DE4life]

IF could produce an album which solely consists of Anders burping the alphabet and Bjorn farting between each letter, recorded on a built-in webcam mic, and Ciko would be like "don't get the hate, it's actually really creative and better production than Clayman imo".

 

[The Grayfox]

I don't really get the hate for Clayman re-record at all.

 

[DE4life]

Fuck the Clayman re-recording and fuck modern IF, I want real 90s MDM.



Hardly anyone knows these guys but Thunderbeast is better than anything IF has produced since Clayman.

 

[eochaid]

Having in mind that CC is my favourite IF album, a fine piece of guitar melodies and riffing combined with Anders' best vocals (even with the help of autotunes), then I cannot agree for obvious reasons.

 

[DE4life]

Well, you could agree anyway just to give a middle finger to Anders and Bjorn

 

[eochaid]

Fuck it! You're right!

 

[DE4life]

If I'm being honest I prefer Reroute, CC and SOAPF to Thunderbeast, but Dawnlight Garden was a better release than I, the Mask - even if Winterspawn's middle section is a total rip off of Dead Eternity at least when Night in Gales rip off IF they make it sound great. When IF rip off themselves they invariably manage to make the older material sound worse.