The Grayfox
#MusicTheoryBro
Yeah, but it still sounds good. Somehow. I remember back in the day, the two songs that everyone always wanted in the set were Goliaths and Stand Ablaze.
New album Foregone out February 2023
- Thread starter TheJestersDoor
- Start date
mindd
Faithless by Default
Goliaths is fantastic, fairly sure it's never been played live though. Can't remember ever hearing any bootlegs with Goliath on, even from the really early days.
ThePhobiac
be at ease
TJR/Whoracle lyrics are like taking a really good concept in Swedish, translating it to English with Babelfish, then back to Swedish, then back to English. It's more sophisticated language than what came after, but it's not always coherent. Morphing Into Primal is a really impressive exception.
To me In Flames lyrics peaked with R2R/STYE, in that Anders's grasp of English was good enough to avoid really awkward phrasing, had some good passages ("don't release these chains, never been closer to myself"; "I sink in waters deep, your presence kept my floating far from depths where secrets lie, maybe in another lifetime I could be the first you meet"), and still dealt with introspective themes in a way that wasn't hackneyed or whiny.
Clayman was good, too, but it had its moments of weirdness ("Conflict serum is my aura"...huh?)
To me In Flames lyrics peaked with R2R/STYE, in that Anders's grasp of English was good enough to avoid really awkward phrasing, had some good passages ("don't release these chains, never been closer to myself"; "I sink in waters deep, your presence kept my floating far from depths where secrets lie, maybe in another lifetime I could be the first you meet"), and still dealt with introspective themes in a way that wasn't hackneyed or whiny.
Clayman was good, too, but it had its moments of weirdness ("Conflict serum is my aura"...huh?)
Come Clarity's lyrics are pretty good too. ASOP is where lyrical quality took a nosedive and never really recovered.
Edit: Actually I take that back having just read through CC's lyrics. Some good stuff there (Reflect the Storm, Dead End, Vacuum, Vanishing Light), but some total garbage and a lot of really basic, uninteresting stuff too. TTL is kinda cringe. Scream is pathetic. The title track... "Could you add colour inside these lines"
PDT and Versus Terminus, boring lyrics. Our Infinite Struggle, bleh. Bedtime Story is OK.
Edit: Actually I take that back having just read through CC's lyrics. Some good stuff there (Reflect the Storm, Dead End, Vacuum, Vanishing Light), but some total garbage and a lot of really basic, uninteresting stuff too. TTL is kinda cringe. Scream is pathetic. The title track... "Could you add colour inside these lines"
PDT and Versus Terminus, boring lyrics. Our Infinite Struggle, bleh. Bedtime Story is OK.
Last edited:
The Grayfox
#MusicTheoryBro
ThePhobiac
be at ease
Come Clarity's lyrics are pretty good too. ASOP is where lyrical quality took a nosedive and never really recovered.
Edit: Actually I take that back having just read through CC's lyrics. Some good stuff there (Reflect the Storm, Dead End, Vacuum, Vanishing Light), but some total garbage and a lot of really basic, uninteresting stuff too. TTL is kinda cringe. Scream is pathetic. The title track... "Could you add colour inside these lines"
Yeah, CC is too edgy for its own good. Not terrible, though. I'd take it over what came after any day.
But like, this passage from Dial 595-Escape:
"Testing higher mentality
I conquer myself through this
A furious path to walk
New space exists beyond
In silence I dwell displeased
Remain with the seed of unfulfillment"
or from System:
"I blame and run, sadly all too often
I dive into the day without your sympathy
I tend to try but lack the focus
Becoming a distant memory
What once was is quickly forgotten
All wrapped up inside
Delete all resemblance
I feel your relief"
Like, it's introverted and self-pitying stuff, but it's put in an interesting way (he actually rhymes "sympathy" and "memory" in a way that doesn't feel forced), flows well, and feels way more relatable than cliche shit like "please heal me, I can't sleep, thought I was unbreakable but this is killing me."
ThePhobiac
be at ease
It'll probably be back after a couple days. DT removed some of their old stuff a while back before Moment was released, but those albums were back up in no time.
The Grayfox
#MusicTheoryBro
ThePhobiac
be at ease
Yeah, but what's weird is that it was bad in the 90s, then pretty good in the early 00s, then got bad again.
The Grayfox
#MusicTheoryBro
Yeah, that is pretty weird actually. Also, it's been a while since I've really paid attention to live videos and such, but has Anders been phoning it in to an extreme level lately? I know he's been doing that for a long time to a degree, but it seems pretty bad lately.
Xpyro125
Member
- Dec 1, 2021
- 507
- 229
- 43
I actually love Come Clarity's lyrics, though I will admit that you do have to look into some of them to really understand the meanings.
"Take This Life" is edgy as fuck, surface or not, but I really like that it's about taking care of oneself and persisting through any rough times. The title track is about his daughter and how she gave him a new purpose in life (The color line is absolutely a throwaway line if you don't know the meaning of the song), "Leeches" is fucking incredible, "Scream"... Alright, you got me there, that one's pretty fucking edgy, and the meaning doesn't go deep enough to make the song three-dimensional.
The first half of STYE's lyrics are pretty good, but the latter half (Aside from "Borders and Shading" and "Discover Me Like Emptiness") starting with the latter half of "Evil in a Closet" are rife with cheesy, awkward, downright stupid lines. Something like "In Search of I" is barely clever enough to make the tongue-and-cheek style of its chorus work, and "Superhero of the Computer Rage"... No, I just don't care for it whatsoever.
EDIT: "Bottled"'s lyrics are the best part about the song, and that's depressing.
I can completely agree about ASoP. The lyrics are easily the thing I hate the most about the album, as they just make me feel fucking awful whenever listening to it for an extended period of time. It's all emo bullshit without feeling like it should be, and coming off the heels of CC, it's fucking baffling. I mean, Anders just went on about how his daughter gave him a new purpose in life, he has a son now, and his band is really doing what they want by this point- I'd never say that it means that you can't be depressed in such a state or that things can't change over the two year period, but it just feels inauthentic at best and absolutely abhorrent at worst. "Move Through Me" is the only exception, and I actually fucking love that song's lyrics from the RPG-feeling chorus to the positive, uplifting message overall. Not every song needs to be like that, I usually listen to music with rather negative, sad, and/or depressing lyrics, but ASoP's are just overbearing, ingenuine, and really bad, and that's the worst kind of emo bullshit there is.
"Take This Life" is edgy as fuck, surface or not, but I really like that it's about taking care of oneself and persisting through any rough times. The title track is about his daughter and how she gave him a new purpose in life (The color line is absolutely a throwaway line if you don't know the meaning of the song), "Leeches" is fucking incredible, "Scream"... Alright, you got me there, that one's pretty fucking edgy, and the meaning doesn't go deep enough to make the song three-dimensional.
The first half of STYE's lyrics are pretty good, but the latter half (Aside from "Borders and Shading" and "Discover Me Like Emptiness") starting with the latter half of "Evil in a Closet" are rife with cheesy, awkward, downright stupid lines. Something like "In Search of I" is barely clever enough to make the tongue-and-cheek style of its chorus work, and "Superhero of the Computer Rage"... No, I just don't care for it whatsoever.
EDIT: "Bottled"'s lyrics are the best part about the song, and that's depressing.
I can completely agree about ASoP. The lyrics are easily the thing I hate the most about the album, as they just make me feel fucking awful whenever listening to it for an extended period of time. It's all emo bullshit without feeling like it should be, and coming off the heels of CC, it's fucking baffling. I mean, Anders just went on about how his daughter gave him a new purpose in life, he has a son now, and his band is really doing what they want by this point- I'd never say that it means that you can't be depressed in such a state or that things can't change over the two year period, but it just feels inauthentic at best and absolutely abhorrent at worst. "Move Through Me" is the only exception, and I actually fucking love that song's lyrics from the RPG-feeling chorus to the positive, uplifting message overall. Not every song needs to be like that, I usually listen to music with rather negative, sad, and/or depressing lyrics, but ASoP's are just overbearing, ingenuine, and really bad, and that's the worst kind of emo bullshit there is.
I actually remembered Leeches lyrics being cool, then I looked at them again and was like... they're actually pretty basic. Not bad, but not on the level of previous albums either.
ISFI lyrics are fine until the chorus, which is just a whole new level of dumb.
ASOP lyrics are just totally fake. Anders writing what he thinks teenagers feel like for most of the songs. I think before then his lyrics were personally introspective, regardless of quality, but on ASOP it was just Anders thoughts on what the younger crowd feels and wants to hear. I'm not sure he's ever really gone back to writing genuine lyrics.
Xpyro125
Member
- Dec 1, 2021
- 507
- 229
- 43
I think that basic lyrics can be good if they have depth to back them, which I'd say "Leeches" does. Something like "Scream" doesn't, and it's easily the weakest song on CC lyrically speaking.
Gotta agree completely. That's exactly it. Sure, at least they're not written by a toddler like Battles, but at least that album's lyrics don't actively make me feel horrible while listening to the album. Then again, that could just be because I can't keep my goddamn brain awake then.
Xpyro125
Member
- Dec 1, 2021
- 507
- 229
- 43
I can see that. Lyrics like Evil in a Closet, My Sweet Shadow, System or Only for the Weak have some strong feelings. Even Metaphor comes from the "inside".
I guess that, during those years, he needed to express his deepest emotions. Now, he doesn't seem to have anything relevant to express.
What the fuck means the chorus from OFTW? As much as I like that song, and the lyrics, that doesn't seem to make sense unless I'm missing something.
Xpyro125
Member
- Dec 1, 2021
- 507
- 229
- 43
There are a couple songs from the modern albums that do, like "Here Until Forever" (Not exactly a great song though), "Wallflower", "Deep Inside", and "Stay With Me", but not many more. Then again, I'd have to imagine that it's difficult coming up with lyrics about other things, like going back to the fantasy themes of the older albums or going in a completely different direction. I mean, most of the modern lyrics are still dogshit through and through, but I'll acknowledge that it has to be difficult.
No idea what OFTW's chorus means though. I know it all tangentially correlates to the overall meaning of the song, but deciphering exactly what each line means altogether is a bit more difficult than that.
Similar threads
