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

[DE4life]

No idea what you're talking about Slave, but read any review of one of their recent albums and chances are if it's not a paid off label review there will be a reference to either the band's divided fanbase or the fact they just aren't taken very seriously anymore. I mean, literally, the first two reviews you find on google for Battles open like this:

"When a band changes their style and sound, it can be polarizing. Melodic death metal pioneers In Flames have experienced this with their fans, as their sound has grown more accessible over the years with fewer growling vocals."

"I never thought I’d say these words: “I WAS an In Flames fan.” Those of you that have followed In Flames from the very beginning, know that the Swedes have a divisive melodic death discography that extends nearly as long as my arm. From the 90s (high points included The Jester Race, Whoracle and Colony) to the 00s (highlights being Come Clarity and A Sense of Purpose) it’s difficult to believe that today’s In Flames is even the same band."

There are very few bands I can think of where pretty much all reviews point out how divisive the band is, usually in the first paragraph. Literally the first thing anybody thinks about when In Flames are mentioned is either "oh, that band that used to be awesome?" or "oh, the band which has so many haters!"

Bands experiment. It isn't uncommon. But when experimentation goes too far it tends to become a side or solo project for the band members interested in going in a different direction. Very rarely is the main band diluted to the point where people no longer know what that band is supposed to represent. The reality is that it's just Hipster & Bjorn's plaything at this juncture, but that's not exactly a hook when neither of them are exactly musical geniuses.

 

[galvanized]

Evolution is not necessarily good. The latest Covers ep, Down Wicked and No Good, they put out last year was the worst piece of shit I have ever heard from this band, but it was an evolution from Battles and SC.

 

[Jester Slave]

Divisive is not necessarily bad. But we also can't treat Battles the same way as R2R. This discussion came about with R2R, and you talk about Battles now. Let's divide it into

1. pre-TJR
2. TJR-Clayman
3. R2R-ASOP
4. post-ASOP

Also, I'm really tired from how everything has to be personal nowadays. This psychological terror needs to stop, seriously. I WAS IN LOVE WITH THE BAND FOR 200 YEARS, I NAMED MY KID ANDERS, AND NOW THEY DID THIS TO ME????? FROM THIS DAY ONWARDS, I DO NOT LIKE THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! - shut the fuck up and say that you think this record is bad, no one gives a fuck about the rest; IF is not your girl-/boyfriend and never was.

As for their latest EP, I think it was fun. No Good is pretty fucking good, Down in a Hole is okay, the rest is shit. For a cover EP that's solid work.

edit: also, after Everything Counts and Land of Confusion, I'm not sure if a cover EP is an evolution. It's never been far from the band.

 

[galvanized]

Just because it’s a cover EP doesn’t mean they get a free pass. It still represented what they thought was good. And it’s not. It’s worse than Battles or anything. Not just the composition which they didn’t do, but the playing, recording, overall sound. Total shit. The new album will show us if they keep going in that direction. If they do it will be a shitty evolution.

 

[eochaid]

As I said, evolution and change aren't good or bad. It depends on the final result. IF did good and bad albums evolving and did good and bad albums changing.

 

[krofius]

Don't know if anyone here listens to Gojira as much as I do but they also had a somewhat drastic change in sound on their latest album, compared to their sound previously. I had no problem at all with it but some people did, I wouldn't in any way think they are trying to sellout though, he said he wanted to evolve his vocals and is tired of doing screams/growls only. I don't think the album is anywhere close to their best though, I personally prefer them more aggressive with harsh vocals. The last album included a bunch of clean or clean-ish vocals, as opposed to almost no clean vocals previous in their career. I think some people and bands just honestly need drastic changes in their life.

To me that is still evolution though. It's like Mastodon as well, they especially on first 3 albums had majority of screams, and nowadays they have maybe a few lyrics of screams if even that.

And yes it's obviously all subjective when it comes to music. We all have to remember what fucking garbage the majority of all people in our society listens to, nothing of the stuff we are discussing is anywhere close to that garbage at least.

 

[eochaid]

And yes it's obviously all subjective when it comes to music. We all have to remember what fucking garbage the majority of all people in our society listens to, nothing of the stuff we are discussing is anywhere close to that garbage at least.

Agreed.

Just living in spain with all the shitty music that people is exposed to here... Even children as young as 7 are listening to reggaeton at school.

 

[ThePhobiac]

It’s more of a tangent EP than anything, but Down, Wicked, and No Good was, from my perspective, substantially better than Battles and had much better production, too. Renewed my faith in the band somewhat.

Also, because there was some Disturbed talk a few pages back: never been a big fan, but Believe is by far the best thing they’ve ever done. It’s nu-metal, but, like Deftones, it’s cleverly-written. They’re a cut above most of their peers. Unlike Deftones, though, I wouldn’t go out of my way to listen to ‘em.

 

[galvanized]

Interesting. When I listened to it my impression was that it sounded very much like Battles with even more auto tune. I’ll have to listen again with earphones.

 

[ThePhobiac]

There's roughly the same amount of autotune, and it's still in the same musical strain as Battles. It has thicker production, I find, whereas Battles' production, while decent all around, lacks heft. The difference is that the arrangements on this EP are great, partially because the original songs are excellent, but also because the band did a great job making them their own. And, vocally, Anders mostly stays within his range.

"It's No Good" just sounds cool. Everything clicks, and Anders sounds really good. Like almost every IF cover, it's far better than the original. These guys know their synthpop inside and out and it translates really well into the IF style.

I also liked how the guitars served as more of a backdrop and contributed more to the mood of the songs while pianos and synths took the lead — "Down in a Hole" reminded me of gothic metal bands I used to listen to back in the day, for instance. That drumkit is also infectious. Whoever in the band decided to use that sound is a genius. That's the kind of simple and subtle touch that makes a song for me.

And of course I enjoyed "Wicked Game"s even balance of piano and guitars — they should incorporate piano in their music more often, like in "Ordinary Story" and "Your Bedtime Story." They do it really well. I'm kind of hoping that their live keyboardist joins them in the studio and throws more of that in. There'd be a greater chance that keys will become more integral to the music, rather than just ornamentation, which is what they've mostly been until now.

I like "Hurt", too, and I think Anders is probably one of those vocalists the song is made for because he has a rough/sucky vocal style. You have to be old or kind of bad to pull it off well, I think. It's my least favorite because it's live and unpolished, but w/e.

Again, that's just my take. The fact that it wasn't well-received is a shame, because I think it's rock solid. But I was smiling throughout my first listen after going in with middling expectations. It gives me some hope for the next album.

 

[eochaid]

To me it sounded as if they have some personal grudge against those bands or songs and wanted to destroy them at all costs.

 

[miniroch]

New Soilwork. Maybe bit too much pop in the chorus, but damn, I love it.

 

[DE4life]

Just sounds like normal Soilwork to me. I mean, it's fine, but it's just Soilwork.

 

[krofius]

Yeah new Soilwork track is also very good, I liked Arrival more, maybe because this one took like 2-3 listens to understand better. But like you said, really nice chorus. Soilwork or rather Björn is a god at creating catchy choruses.

 

[Pallbearer]

I think if I don't remember wrong, the band has said that Clayman was their worst time recording an album because everyone was fighting with each other, so maybe that also had influence on the next albums sound. But lets be real, in hindsight Clayman to R2R isn't some massive groundbreaking change where you don't recognize the band or anything, you can still clearly hear In Flames and their trademark melodies, sadly the production is just a bit muddy. Would have been really interesting to hear R2R with Fredman sound and see how the comparison would be then. I think it's much more Anders vocals than the music that holds the biggest change on R2R compared to Clayman though.

I've always thought that too, would've been interesting to hear R2R with better production, and to see people's reactions as well. I understand Nordström wasn't an option any longer, and that IF deliberately wanted to try a new sound, but I also remember the producer Bergstrand commenting the yet-to-be-released STYE with "Don't worry, I did better job this time around" (or something like that), which suggests the end result on R2R, production-wise, wasn't completely what he was aiming at. Some people complained how there "weren't leads anymore" even though there still were leads, sometimes they just got buried in the mix.

To me, the album that marked the end of the Old Era wasn't R2R, but STYE. When I went to buy R2R in late 2002 I had very little knowledge of In Flames and their albums. I just had this one song called "The Jester Race" which I loved, wanted to hear more, and I picked R2R mainly just because the record store was advertising it with a big promotional poster. I was shocked at first when I started to listen ("Wait, THIS is In Flames?") but later on the same day I was already enjoying it a lot. STYE, however, left me very disappointed at first and made me wonder whether the band is going to stick with that sound for many years to come. But fortunately next came CC.

 

[galvanized]

I understand Nordström wasn't an option any longer, and that IF deliberately wanted to try a new sound, but I also remember the producer Bergstrand commenting the yet-to-be-released STYE with "Don't worry, I did better job this time around" (or something like that), which suggests the end result on R2R, production-wise, wasn't completely what he was aiming at. Some people complained how there "weren't leads anymore" even though there still were leads, sometimes they just got buried in the mix.

That is interesting, b/c the sound of STYE is very different than R2R. I would have preferred a refined R2R production job. But they went to the opposite extreme instead.

To me, the album that marked the end of the Old Era wasn't R2R, but STYE.

Good insight. I also feel that way. I’m not big on R2R but I can accept it with the classic albums. In fact, something like half the songs on R2R could just be Clayman songs with different production and some clean singing. Examples: Egonomic, Minus, Dismiss the Cynics, Dark Signs, Drifter, Trigger, Dawn of a New Day (if this was on Whoracle it would have just been an instrumental).

Then you have a mix of simpler and new style songs. Down tuned guitars, fewer harmonies, slower, or a lot more singing. So in that sense I guess R2R was a bridge to STYE. But with STYE pretty much everything was new style.

 

[DE4life]

In a lot of ways STYE was the black sheep of the IF discography, up until Siren Charms came out anyway. In some ways you could argue R2R was an evolution of Clayman, albeit a questionable one. STYE was just completely different from anything that came before or after it.

 

[eochaid]

I don't see many similarities between clayman and r2r. Different riffs, different kind of vocals, different... Too many differences.

 

[DE4life]

If there were a lot of similarities then it wouldn't be much of an evolution. They basically took the Clayman sound and distilled it into something simpler, lyrically, musically and conceptually. You could argue that it was actually a devolution but there's still no doubt it's In Flames, although it'd be more obvious if the audio hadn't been processed through an underwater filter.

The only way you can tell STYE is In Flames is Anders' vocals.

 

[ciko_gfb]

OK boys and girls I come with big news. I was missing like 2 weeks cause I was trying to solve this puzzle. We all thought about it at some point but now we know it for sure. You ready? Here we go:
JESTER SLAVE = ANDERS FRIDEN.

Fact: Jester Slave is the biggest Anders Friden lover (beside me) and big fan of Nine Inch Nails.
I was watching a new interview with Anders today and he mentioned that one of best concert he attended is Nine Inch Nails and how Nine Inch Nails are perfect band. Big mistake Slave, big mistake! With my Sherlock skills, I went inside my mind palace and remembered it.The only other person loves Nine Inch Nails like this is Jester Slave. The rest is as you know. So you can understand why Slave is so protective about Anders because he IS Anders!

Here's that interview, no news about new album though.