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

Wow, I did not expect that concession. One down, two to go. Krofius, Ciko, do the honourable thing and concede defeat.

Defeat? I dont think so. :D Well of course some of the lyrics are silly but not all of them. I have quite few lyrics from the Battles and Siren Charms that had my feelings at that time. I'm not high school student though, I even finished University this year. :D It's not just IF, every band has good or silly lyrics and I can't blame Anders if he feels that things and write about it, sure it might be silly but it still has some value to me. And I'm really hyped about new single cause it has some lines that I can relate. Some lines are silly to me too but not all of them.
 
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And I'm actually grateful to Anders for changing his lyrical style. I really dont give shit about the space and stuff lyrics cause its boring. He has some shitty lines (I feel like shit etc.) but also has great lines that I can relate.
 
And I'm actually grateful to Anders for changing his lyrical style. I really dont give shit about the space and stuff lyrics cause its boring. He has some shitty lines (I feel like shit etc.) but also has great lines that I can relate.

Tbf this is the Slave school of thought again, suggesting that if we don't want silly, childish lyrics we must want stuff about space (and stuff?). Nobody is asking for TJR/Whoracle style lyrics. Literally nobody on this thread has even suggested that. Colony, Clayman, Reroute, STYE & Come Clarity had plenty of personal lyrics which actually had some thought behind them. Even ASOP and SOAPF have some really good moments.

I just find it genuinely hilarious that anybody would see those shitty, cliched lyrics posted on top of children's artwork and think "that's awesome". Maybe it's a language thing? I dunno. I often wonder if foreigners see english words and don't understand how lame they sometimes look to native speakers. But then, A88 and Eochaid think they're shit too, so...?

Also @krofius wtf is this? https://www.instagram.com/claymanlimited/
 
Tbf this is the Slave school of thought again, suggesting that if we don't want silly, childish lyrics we must want stuff about space (and stuff?). Nobody is asking for TJR/Whoracle style lyrics. Literally nobody on this thread has even suggested that. Colony, Clayman, Reroute, STYE & Come Clarity had plenty of personal lyrics which actually had some thought behind them. Even ASOP and SOAPF have some really good moments.

I never said that why do you guys want space lyrics I just said that I prefer this kind of lyrics, how did you come on that conclusion from that post? :D Dont know if I wrote something like that (which I checked now and I'm sure I didnt even mention it on the 2 posts I wrote) or you just twist my words to win an argument. Or maybe you're just too sensitive about anything, even my opinion feels like I'm attacking you. :D
 
I never said that why do you guys want space lyrics I just said that I prefer this kind of lyrics, how did you come on that conclusion from that post? :D Dont know if I wrote something like that (which I checked now and I'm sure I didnt even mention it on the 2 posts I wrote) or you just twist my words to win an argument. Or maybe you're just too sensitive about anything, even my opinion feels like I'm attacking you. :D

Sorry, I've obviously spent too much time dealing with Krofius and Slave :D give me a break.

I don't particularly want to win any arguments as that would be the end of discussion, and it'd be disappointing for the entertainment to end.
 
It hurts so much to see Anders at his worst (or is it?).
I want so much more of the time & space & stuff lyrics from the guy, while he's been producing some of the worst since ASOP.
God damn it, even with Dark Tranquillity getting pretty close to their worst, they still do things like (from Endtime Hearts):

Righting the imbalance
In a difference of hearts
Close to breakage
Soon to fall
Fought the urge
To carry through
Held on to the real
Sacrifice the ego
Sacrifice the I

With In Flames, for the last couple of years all I heard was "I'm brokenhearted, it hurts, cut my throat to sleep". And all I can say is, it really hurts. And I can already imagine Anders whining about being the ghost, like he did in Alias. And I'm truly brokenhearted, cause at some point he was seeing beauty in dead flowers. And at the time being, he's at his room. And he is sad. And all I can hope for, is one day he get's better.

And don't get me wrong, I love listening to this guy, both live and on album. I just wish he was better. And not sad. And not in his room and singing for his children.
 
I wish I was a smoker instead of ever finding this board, because then I'd have less chance of getting cancer.

Anyways, SC had decent to good lyrics as well, and I believe it was the least high-schooly lyrics in recent years, including SOAPF and ASOP. As someone said, he may have made the mistake of trying too hard to be MySteRiOuS there, but that's a different question now.

And no one said the new lyrics are awesome. I said that one snippet looked decent, good. How am I being criticized for hyperboles when you do the same?

Also, aren't you a fucking yankee? Shoudln't you celebrate stealing others' land or something? You have way too much freetime today.
 
It hurts so much to see Anders at his worst (or is it?).
I want so much more of the time & space & stuff lyrics from the guy, while he's been producing some of the worst since ASOP.

With In Flames, for the last couple of years all I heard was "I'm brokenhearted, it hurts, cut my throat to sleep". And all I can say is, it really hurts. And I can already imagine Anders whining about being the ghost, like he did in Alias. And I'm truly brokenhearted, cause at some point he was seeing beauty in dead flowers. And at the time being, he's at his room. And he is sad. And all I can hope for, is one day he get's better.

And don't get me wrong, I love listening to this guy, both live and on album. I just wish he was better. And not sad. And not in his room and singing for his children.

In fairness, I get the feeling Sundin was more interested in space, seeing beauty in dead flowers, etc, than Anders ever was :D pretty much as soon as Anders started writing his own lyrics (basically Colony onwards) there was a massive shift away from abstract lyrics to intrinsic lyrics focusing on how much life sucks. Even Colony had Embody the Invisible, Ordinary Story, Scorn, and a few others that were focusing more on personal issues.

I wish I was a smoker instead of ever finding this board, because then I'd have less chance of getting cancer.

Anyways, SC had decent to good lyrics as well, and I believe it was the least high-schooly lyrics in recent years, including SOAPF and ASOP. As someone said, he may have made the mistake of trying too hard to be MySteRiOuS there, but that's a different question now.

And no one said the new lyrics are awesome. I said that one snippet looked decent, good. How am I being criticized for hyperboles when you do the same?

Also, aren't you a fucking yankee? Shoudln't you celebrate stealing others' land or something? You have way too much freetime today.

Who are you talking to? My location is under my avatar and I don't see "USA" anywhere :D

Oh yeah, those awesome SC lyrics.

"Deep inside
The memories that are left behind
Close my eyes
I've been hopelessly lost in the fear
Are you for real?"

That's some fucking deep insight right there. Whoa.

"No
I won't
I need this
Truth is.....

Once you had enough
Break out
Room to breathe
To love
Before you're gone"

Must have taken months to come up with this.

"Turn away
Run away
From all the things we have to do

And it tears away our hearts and our soul

It's like we're on our own
To figure out
Cast out
Paralyzed
Rewind
There's no time
The wasteland.... It's an indication"

So deep man.

I could go on but no. SC lyrics are shit and much like the guitar riffs on the album have the very minimum of effort put into them.
 
Relationship problems aren’t the dominant force in my life and even if they were I don’t need a million songs reminding me about it. I’m looking for new ideas, images, etc. I’m looking for new lyrics like these:


I often dream of huge, numb buildings
jet-black, sinister architecture
being installed when nobody sees.
Their appearance so sudden
that few would take notice.

And when I wake up
I imagine being crushed by one,
imagining its weight, its silence
and the absence of excuses for a havoced life
and the privilege of a 22-kilometre tombstone.

Jotun.

A body of black
that carried no reflection
defying its own room
un-earthly eggs of decreation

There would be colonies
mushroom-scattered, forever out of context
rising spores from a dying world
to pollute, to chase away what's left

Sun-white, pulverised desert stone
and serpentine lizard mouths.
Pales away the pyramids,
rewriting 4,500 years of history
raping the statue of liberty
outplays the acropolis
inverting the fjords
invades the N.Y. skyline to
dream its own existence in one single final word.

Jotun.

Can we identify them
as the flint buried in our reptile skulls
or the time-bomb coded in our DNA.
 
Was Anders a lyrical genius or a poet writing those lyrics? No. But they piqued your interest and say what you want but they were very original if not weird.
 
IF was at its best and most relevant around Colony-Clayman era. Also, that was the best mix between integrity and comercial sucess.

They were relevant and that albums stand the test of time. Any song from Clayman is quality (songwriting, lyrics and sound/mix) even today.

Everything after that is going downhills with occasional flashes of bright light (parts of cc, soapf, rtr... come to mind).

No matter how much (self)deluded people are, battles, sc, asop etc is just slapping idiotic words in simple sentences over basic song structures composed from recycled riffs and a few notes melodies. And I think it shows...

Sometimes, when bands end up like this, they manage to do one or two "return to form" albums. Thats what I'm hoping to hear from IF. Sadly, judging from this lyrics and artwork... not gonna happen. It's a different group of people. And not in a good way (like the new guitarist of Judas Priest, or new Nightwish singer or any other example of that kind).
 
Sadly, judging from this lyrics and artwork... not gonna happen. It's a different group of people. And not in a good way (like the new guitarist of Judas Priest, or new Nightwish singer or any other example of that kind).
Yeah, I think they’ve made a business decision to continue with the core members as it is. And there are no more new ideas from them. I’m sure they are counting on it for income and retirement now. Inviting someone new would be splitting dividends further.
 
Is this really true? I could understand it being the case 10-12 years ago, but now? What kids are listening to modern In Flames? I find it really bizarre to think that anybody much younger than 25 is seriously listening to this band's latest output. Maybe I'm wrong and the world has passed me by, but I'd be really surprised if In Flames have a significant younger fan base.

The honest answer is that the world has indeed passed you — and myself — by as far as modern mainstream metal goes. It was a surprising revelation to me, but that's part of getting older.

For example, I worked as a 911 dispatcher during the years SOAPF, SC, and Battle were released, and we always had the radio tuned in to the hard rock and metal channels. I worked with people about five to ten years younger than me in a job with high turnover, so I got a lot of exposure to young adult music taste. They liked the typical stuff that we would normally dismiss — Five Finger Death Punch, Volbeat, Sixx AM, Starset. And they love In Flames, especially SOAPF and Battles. And I mean *loved* SOAPF, the way we worship The Jester Race. They had no idea that they had a back catalog of nine other albums, either. In Flames is part of that rotation of mainstream bands now. And my younger siblings' friends are all into that new metal, but they're also big fans of the new In Flames.

I even played some older In Flames for some of those people, just to give them a "history lesson", and they couldn't get into it. It just wasn't to their taste.

I personally don't get it, and I can't believe what I'm hearing on hard rock and metal radio channels these days, but that's on me. I, and many other people, have become out of touch with what's popular.

That's mostly anecdotal evidence, but I would say that our conception of what metal is supposed to be differs from that of what casual metal listeners consider it to be. Dark Tranquillity and At the Gates aren't speaking *directly* to that new "generation" of fans, which is why they're more niche. In Flames has adapted to that new audience, and that audience has been receptive to them, and so their lyrical quality and music has adjusted accordingly.

Speaking of which, I overheard "Delight and Angers" the other day on my brother's Spotify and I still have no idea how that song was so popular for a while. One of the few IF songs I actually hate. But, again, it's a hit among all the younger people I know and have met.
 
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Well, it's good that younger metalheads like SOAPF as that is a great album... a shame about the rest :D it's just strange because nowadays I see very little chatter about In Flames. Their reddit page is dead as a doornail, JesterHead is dead in all but name, their record sales have been in consistent decline for years... I appreciate they still had some momentum around the SOAPF period but I wonder how much of that was killed off by SC and Battles? SC got a lot of negative attention, but Battles was briefly there and then just seemed to be gone from the public consciousness. Even on here we only really talked about the album itself for probably 15-20% of the album thread? When die hard In Flames fanboys like Krofius and Slave are shitting on Battles you know something has gone wrong.
 
Drained in particular has to be up there as some of the most shitty, puerile, vomit-inducing words ever put to paper or music

That's total nihilism right there...and you are accusing Slave of exaggeration with the quantum physics.

I have quite few lyrics from the Battles and Siren Charms that had my feelings at that time. I'm not high school student though, I even finished University this year. :D It's not just IF, every band has good or silly lyrics and I can't blame Anders if he feels that things and write about it, sure it might be silly but it still has some value to me. And I'm really hyped about new single cause it has some lines that I can relate. Some lines are silly to me too but not all of them.

Couldn't agree more. Congrats on finishing University, man. I will hopefully finish University in a couple of months too.
Anyway, I am no highschool student either and there are some lyrics of Anders from the latest albums that I can relate to. Of course there are some stupid ones, but that's the case with most bands.

The perfect balance would be if Anders was writing personal relatable stuff, but with the depth and the complexity of the earlier albums. I guess we cannot have everything.
 
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Oh, not from the US, true. Still, not sure how Paralyzed is a shameful representation of Anders' lyrics, when it's like Abnegation part 2. But don't let me interrupt your bias.

As for Delight and Angers, it was one of my favorites from ASOP in high-school. Yeah, looking back it's very cheesy, but I am still grateful for the moments when I loved it back then. If it makes old people angry, then all the better.
 
And please, don't say shit like Clayman had great lyrics. If Only For The Weak's lyric sheet was released today, you would tear it apart for being extremely edgy. But since it's on Clayman, it's great.


Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
 
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And please, don't say shit like Clayman had great lyrics. If Only For The Weak's lyric sheet was released today, you would tear it apart for being extremely edgy. But since it's on Clayman, it's great.


Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
What are you talking about? The use of metaphors is great in that song.
 
And they love In Flames, especially SOAPF and Battles. And I mean *loved* SOAPF, the way we worship The Jester Race.
This is really interesting music from the front lines. Maybe I am just getting old. But it seems like there are still plenty of metal heads like us out there. It’s not like we died off.
it's just strange because nowadays I see very little chatter about In Flames. Their reddit page is dead as a doornail, JesterHead is dead in all but name, their record sales have been in consistent decline for years...
This. I want to know where all these new fans are hanging out. Is it on Anders’ Instagram? Any one do social media analytics and can say if this is “popular” or not?

Instagram
Anders Fridén — 33k
In Flames — 148k
Mikael Stanne — 13.5k followers
Dark Tranquility — 45k followers
Soilwork — 33k followers
Arch Enemy — 411k followers (yeah 10x higher)
Opeth — 132k
Behemoth — 394k
Five Finger Death Punch — 689k
Asking Alexandria - 1.1M followers
Slipknot — 3M followers



Also, all album sales have been declining across the board. Comparing album to album doesn’t really work, you have to scale it by the decreasing trend or to other albums that came out at the same time. Not that I’m an expert at that stuff, but I’ve seen some analysis done before. Would be cool if someone here could tell us how In Flames really stacks up.
 
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