I wouldn't talk about misinterpretation when you constantly talk about things out of context, and are always very liberal whether you use critical thinking or not. Like right now, it's painfully obvious that you are omitting it; if it was something that you wouldn't like to hear, you'd tear it apart.
What music direction is he talking about? Their music direction was ASOP when he left (well, he was probably forced to leave), so that's gonna be a serious doubt from me dawg. We can make up some shitty stories about the possibility that Anders was showing Jesper some of his ideas about future song ideas, but we all know IF is lazy as fuck, and the song themselves start out by Björn and Jesper to begin with.
Or do we want to blame Anders' voice on the record? The problem is, Jesper was very nasty about Anders enhancing his voice on the records, and given how varied he sounded from TJR till that point (ASOP), there was absolutely no indication that he would deliver his singing the same way he did on ASOP.
It just stinks, man, and the more Jesper opens his mouth, the more he contradicts himself. I trust him that he would rather return to the pre-R2R sound, but ASOP was the 4th record in a row which featured this "new" In Flames. Isn't it a bit too convenient that the exact time it starts to bother you a lot is when you are about to be kicked out of your own band because you can't function normally due to your drinking habits? Just asking...
If you can make your own reality, Jesper being expelled from the band, then anybody else can.
Umm, what is my made up reality exactly? That a band member was kicked out of the band because he repeatedly sabotaged the band's work and indirectly their future, despite numerous* attempts to help him out or warn him? The pieces are out there, and it doesn't take a rocket-scientist to put them together.
*We will probably never know the extent of this issue. Anders will never come out and name every single time Jesper was sabotaging their work, nor will he tell us how many opportunities Jesper got. Maybe the band was mean and did not help him at all; maybe they put their heart and soul into helping him, but to no use. These are all just theories, not facts. But the issue itself was real.
Fun trivia: There was a similar situation here, except that one of the musicians chose to tell everything to the media. It was a rap duo, very famous here, but during one of the shows, Majka (one part of the duo) told the audience that it is really fucking sad that it came to this, but his partner is not here, and won't be. He couldn't make it, because he is coked out his mind, and effective immediately he is kicked out from the band.
Later, he gave an hour long interview where he exposed his bandmate. He talked about how many shows he had to cancel because his partner was in some coke-frenzy and was afraid to come to the stage, or simply turned off his phone hours before the show. Long story short, it divided the people. Some praised him for trying everything in order to help his friend out, others were blasting him for talking about these private stuff in public.
I think everyone is better off that Anders sticked with the "it's sad to lose a friend, but our problems were too big" story, rather than exposing a quasi hero figure to many of you. I wish that Majka interview was translated, because the amount of shit we, the people don't know about what's going on with being in a group with an addict is brutal. He said he cut his partner's pay in HALF, and told him that if he can complete X amount of shows, he will get it. His partner agreed but couldn't do it. He rather coked himself out so much that he couldn't go onstage and lost half his fucking income.
I dunno. It is weird though.
