Review Summary: In Flames continue on their crusade of changing music, but this time fall flat on their face.
This album was always going to be a challenge for In Flames as a band. Come Clarity had been received pretty well by the fans and was considered one their better 'new' albums. However, even bands such as In Flames can completely miss the point! Even the rather dodgy Soundtrack To Your Escape had the occasional highlight, such as My Sweet Shadow or Evil In A Closet. This album, however, doesn't really have anything memorable to say about itself. The main problem is that IF have 'dumbed down' their music, possibly in an attempt to appeal to a wider audience. At times this strays into NU Metal territory, and gets dangerously close to becoming infected with this.
The opening track, The Mirror's Truth, was released as a single sometime before the album's release and is actually quite an enjoyable song. It's thrashy and fun and is melodic, but its just not as grand sounding as their older material. Gone are the days of Ander's harsh screaming, and instead it is replaced by something falling somewhere between clean vocals and screaming. It does seem somewhat out of place for an IF album. The second song, Disconnected, features a chorus that sounds almost identical to that of the song that preceeded it. It does seem rather lazy of the band to allow this to happen, and to highlight this even more by putting both songs one after the other on the album.
How can Anders' new vocal style be described? It is a somewhat stylised style of the heavier moments of Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington's voice. Bascially, it does appear that In Flames are trying to sell out. They'll struggled to even do this though, because a sell out needs to have something appealing to the mainstream listeners. Catchy choruses, for example, which on the whole this album lacks. The songs are well structured as you'd expect but there's no My Sweet Shadow on here, no anthemic System. In fact, nearly every song feels like filler material.
It's not all bad, though. There are some saving graces, and the album finishes up rather well. The penultimate song, Drenched in Fear, has metal feel and a much better chorus than the songs before it. Finishing the album is the great 'March to the Shore', a song which would not seem out of place on Reroute to Remain or even Come Clarity. It has a wonderfully whimsical chorus tune and good guitar work. However, it falls prey to the problems that most of the songs have on this album. The lyrics just don't seem as good as on their previous efforts.
At times, it seems that the lyrics are just an attempt to sound witty or subtle and actually make no sense. The fact that Anders is now singing more cleaner, hence making these words easier to decipher, just highlights the glaring lyrical errors.
'I'm The Highway' has a marvellous opening riff which runs throughout the song at various points. However, it's much like a good trailer for a film. It sounds good but is letdown by the main song. Apart from the melodic opening riff, the song is a little lost and the chorus just doesn't work. 'Alias' is a good attempt at creating a chorus much like that of 'System', but it just sounds a bit too poppy and NU Metal. Don't get me wrong, I very much enjoyed In Flames' new direction especially on Reroute To Remain. However, on that album they at least retained elements of their original sound. Here, they seem to disregard this and just go for a different sound.
I understand their boredom and their need to create a new sound, but this isn't In Flames. It doesn't feel or sound like the Swedish metal titans we all grew to know and love. It just seems like the MeloDeath giants of old are heading into more and more unknown territory. Soon we may lose them altogether. I'd like to believe that this is just a bad album in their career and that they will return bigger and better, but looking at recent albums and the direction they are heading, it seems like they'll just be pumping out more of the same.
Which is a shame.
Good points
-March To The Shore
- The opening riff of I'm The Highway
Bad points
- Strays too far into NU Metal territory
- Pretty naff lyrics
- The songs aren't their best
Songs to download:
- March to the Shore
- The Mirror's Truth
