Just finished listening to the leak of the album, I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would as the singles came out.
1. The Beginning of All Things That Will End- Wonderful opener, the band never goes wrong with their acoustic material. If I had to nitpick, I'd say that I would've liked it to be more adventurous or for them to build off of what they had, but I'm perfectly happy without either of those being the case. 9/10
2. State of Slow Decay- Pretty much what I said since it's dropped. It's a serious grower, and the subdued approach makes it work really well. It's a bit of a safe pick for the lead single, but I think it's a good kind of safe pick, rather than just being a safe or stock song overall. 8/10
3. Meet Your Maker- Easily the weakest song on the album for me. I don't know why, but I just can't jive with this song. The harsh vocals are great, the solo is great, but nothing does anything for me otherwise. The drumming's great too, but it's great on the entire album, so eh. 4/10 again.
4. Bleeding Out- I've been able to come to terms with this one a lot more than Meet Your Maker. It's not the best, but it is pretty good overall. The clean vocals seriously drag it down, and I think I actually could've come to quite like the song if they weren't there. 5.5/10
5. Foregone Pt. 1- Pure Light of Mind and In the Dark are some serious contenders for my favorite song on the album, but I think this'll stay it for now. TGD got me worried for the album, but this propelled my excitement to the stratosphere- Right before I got to see them live too. 9.5/10
6. Foregone Pt. 2- This one hasn't aged too well as time's gone on. The autotune on the cleans (At least outside of the verses) and the overdriven guitar tone just sink it for me. I think using acoustics for it instead of the overdriven guitars (Mind you, not the distorted guitars) would've been a lot better for it, and it would've made this a really cool bridge for the original idea of The Beginning -> Foregone Pt. 2 -> Foregone Pt. 1. Still, I'm happy with the order of the tracks that we got. 5.5/10
7. Pure Light of Mind- I know it's the most radio-friendly alt-rock song on the album (And quite possibly that they've ever done), but it just works. It just works perfectly in a way that I can't quite understand. The vocal melodies are a bit strange upon first listen, but upon repeat listens, they just make sense. The lyrics are also some of the most earnest on the record, even if they aren't high art. It sounds exactly like what one of my best friends would listen to, but in a way I can genuinely appreciate. This right here is the exact reason why I've always been okay with the band potentially shifting towards alt-rock/alt-metal over going back to heaviness. 9.5/10
8. The Great Deceiver- I really didn't like this one at first, but you know what? Meet Your Maker made me seriously appreciate this song. It's so much better than I gave it credit for, and outside of half of the song have shoddy lyrics, yeah, it very much feels like what one would expect from a modern In Flames song. 7/10
9. In the Dark- I know the instrumentals feel like a mix of Bottled and Siren Charms' more boring moments, but... In context, it actually works really fucking well. The vocals, just like in Pure Light of Mind greatly elevate the song too. Sure, that first pre-chorus is a tough pill to swallow, but the chorus itself is amongst the best of the band's modern works, and it finally feels like the band made a song with the chorus succeeding as a centerpiece that everything else works cohesively with. It doesn't just not bring the song to a halt, it keeps a good pace going. 9.5/10
10. A Dialogue in B Flat Minor- There's a bounciness and weirdness to the instrumentals and pacing that reminds me of Pacing Death's Trail and Paralyzed (And Stålfågel by Soilwork), and I absolutely love it. The solo here is fucking phenomenal, and I really hope that Chris stays in the band because he's been making the solowork finally hit for In Flames' modern catalogue. The vocals here are also great too... Except in the chorus and the little bit before it. It's the exact issue of the chorus dragging the song to a halt, which fucking sucks because everything surrounding the chorus is top tier modern IF material. I know we all expected Cynosure to be the weird song, and I think it still is, but this one's right there with it. 8/10
11. Cynosure- It's weird to think that Bjorn made the closest thing we've gotten to a Passenger song in two decades, but yeah. Even the vocals in the verses go back to estimating what Anders sounded like then, just with some effects on them. The vocals in the chorus definitely have some autotuning on them, but I really like that the band and Benson were actually smart enough to use the autotune to make the vocals sound weirder, rather than to make them sound "better". The intelligent use of autotuning here (For once) actually helps to complement and enhance the song. The drumming is a lot more frenetic than that of Passenger, and the jazzy drumming of the bridge is some of the coolest shit I've ever heard from IF's drumming. It's some Deafheaven type shit in that regard, and I love it to pieces. Tanner's a fantastic successor to Daniel, I don't think there's any disputing that. 9/10
12. End the Transmission- It's a bit sluggish in pace, but honestly? It works for the song. Anders' growls actually have a great amount of emotion to them, which is fucking awesome. They feel more dynamic than his standard affair, which has been sorely needed. The chorus' repetition also works pretty well It actually makes for something surprisingly anthemic. 8/10
13. Become One- A standard modern In Flames song done well, nothing too much more to say. 7/10
That pretty much makes an average of 7.7 without the bonus track and 7.65 with it. I reviewed ITM a while back, and yeah, this is higher than what I gave it, which doesn't entirely feel right at all. Then again, the album did manage to avoid everything I feared it'd be, so fuck it, I'm happy with it. It just barely reaches the upper echelon of their discography for me. It's 100% not a return to their classic sound, especially not after listening to the rest of the album, and I can't overstate that. But honestly? I'm perfectly happy with that. Good shit.
