Lyrical Meanings From The Jester Race

[The Grand Design]

Guessing that most of you have read the lyrics from The Jester Race album, have any of you tried to find the meanings behind the lyrics to any of the songs? When I read the lyrics I find them very descriptive but very obscure at the same time and I'm wondering if any of you guys have figured out what Anders is going on about.

 

[CONCLAVE OBSCURUM]

Hummm.. good question you got there. I think i'll have to read the lyrics again...

But, another good question shuld be: Why did Niclas Sundin wrote the lyrics?????

He even wrote the lyrics on Whoracle... what was all that about??

 

[plfffffft]

Hummm.. good question you got there. I think i'll have to read the lyrics again...

But, another good question shuld be: Why did Niclas Sundin wrote the lyrics?????

He even wrote the lyrics on Whoracle... what was all that about??

As far as I can remember, He didn't actually write them. anders didn't have that good of a grasp on the English Language at the time, so he wrote the lyrics in Swedish, and had Niklas translate them, and I guess Niklas took a bit of artistic liberty in his translation.


I could be wrong, though.

 

[Mr. NoReaction]

Yes it is ...

 

[$*$\m/ Catfud \m/$*$]

indeed it is

 

[JesteR-7]

Probabily it is...

 

[The Grand Design]

I know the lyrics in Lord Hypnos are something to do with sleeping. Because Lord Hypnos is the greek god of sleep.

 

[CONCLAVE OBSCURUM]

Yeah... i remember now..

In the booklet says something like: Lyrical concept by Anders Friden.... and some other shit.

 

[Steve]

Anders always wrote the concepts, although Niklas Sundin did write some of the actualy lyrics.

 

[anonymousnick2001]

I think the whole album could be some kind of subliminal concept album about aliens creating the human race as an experiment to amuse them. A jester race. Cool, huh?

 

[Steve]

I think iit's about present humanity racing towards foolish goals.

 

[coronerox]

There is a video of In Flames - Live In Koln, where Anders says that the main conception behind The Jester Race is about the domination of machines and computers, or something like this.....

 

[anonymousnick2001]

Actually, I was joking before. I think their lyrics are utterly ambiguous, and use big words to make them seem really good. Notice how many British and American bands write very poetic lyrics, but they are simpler, because that is how English is actually spoken. I'm sure an IF song in Swedish wouldn't be as wordy and odd. I mean, Pinball Map? Artifacts Of The Black Rain? Bullet Ride? Cloud Connected? Unusual metaphors if you ask me...

 

[Steve]

That's why Niklas helped translate and write the lyrics for a long time.

 

[SpiritCrusherX]

I have the live in Koln video, and I recall the part about Anders saying TJR is about man becoming too dependent on machines.

Also, his English is noticeably worse and his accent is much thicker, as this was pretty early in their career, so maybe whoever said about Niklas having to translate the lyrics due to Anders' not so good grasp on the English lanuage is right.

 

[plfffffft]

I'm pretty sure Swedish and Norwegian schools teach English as a second language from as early as, like, second grade. So, I guess Niklas Sundin and Mikael Stanne paid a lot more attention than Anders.

 

[leffe]

The concept of the album is that mankind these days dont seem to care about their friends and family and also its total disregard for our earth and how we instead are only interested in our careers.

It is also as said before about Anders vision off the future when we have lended to much of our brain to the machine and how we will loose control over them because everyone has forgotten how the machines work since we have trusted them to do all the thinking for us and in the end we might even be overrun by the machines.

 

[Steve]

But they don't teach complex words such as used in The Jester Race.
"Towards the rich archaic heavens
Towars the Black diorama"

I doubt you would lear n the words archaic and diorama, although possibly diorama. I didn't even learn those in school

 

[The Grand Design]

This is what I see inside my mind when reading the lyrics from December Flower.

Imagine it's night time. You are walking along a sandy beach. To your left the waves come in and roll back out at again, lapping at your feet. To your right you see a dark line of trees. You walk towards the trees and you hear the leaves above you rustle in the breeze as you set foot on the soft, cool grass. You walk further and further into the trees and you see a walled garden. You open the gate and walk inside. White roses climb the walls and carpet the ground as the faint light of the moon shines down through the treetops. The wind blows and the gate creaks and shuts behind you. And the floweryard of white and grey is haunted...

 

[Steve]

I never managed to dissect the song that welll