A quick note to the metalheads: The mere fact that I not only own this album, but like it enough to want to write about it should be taken as both a warning away from this record and a hearty endorsement of it. For while it is common knowledge that I have impeccable taste in music, it is also an indisputable fact that the music I generally have impeccable taste in is vintage synthesizer pop from 1987. I may not be the Anti-Metal, but I'm no aficionado either. Put more concretely, prior to my purchase of this record, the only Swedish artists in my collection were ABBA and Ace of Base. (And I do so love my ABBA and Ace of Base.)
The obvious question that arises then, is Why, Paul, Why? Of all the metal out there right now, why In Flames? Every metalhead that I've spoken to about the band invariably raises two salient points about these favorite sons of Gothenburg: 1) As bands go, they're - y'know - okay, and 2) They're way past their prime. The conclusion: In Flames. Ehhh, it's an okay start, but really Paul, you could do so much better. I have to admit here that my specific attraction to the band really has been almost arbitrary. It most certainly had something to do with the fact that their last few albums have been reviewed on this site by some of my favorite writers. And if I'm being totally honest, it also has something to do with their relative commercial success of late.
But then again, it may not be as arbitrary as all that. You see, every Tuesday, I visit my favorite record store to pick up the week's new releases; and this particular record store is staffed primarily by people who, much unlike myself, actually know metal. It's got one of the most thorough metal selections I've ever seen and on any given day, at any given time, you're likely to hear metal playing there. Generally, I'm not really paying a lot of attention, but on at least one day of every week, I spend about a half hour listening to a recent metal record of someone else's (someone else who knows metal) choosing. In that sense, it was only a matter of time before I'd hear something that caught my attention, something that pinned me in place and made me want to browse through the "S"'s in a little more detail, something that, given a free sample maybe, I might fall in love with.
Such was my introduction to In Flames. It was just after the release of their last album, 2004's Soundtrack to Your Escape, and if I remember correctly, I was there that day to pick up the new record by the Chicago indie collective Tortoise. And perhaps, I was merely anticipating an afternoon in thrall to that band's swoony electro-textures, the undulations and oscillations of their jazzy interpretations, that I was drawn to whatever it was I heard in the store. Metal, to be sure. Screaming blue murder metal at that. But a highly textured, layered sort of metal, full of snaky guitar harmonics punctuated by hammering rhythms, avalanching drums and a bass sound so turn-of-the-last-century industrial that I could feel it's vibrations churning my digestive system into a loose, pink jelly. As I approached the counter, Tortoise (and that new EP by They Might Be Giants, and oh yeah, the new Ben Kweller) in hand, I bashfully asked the guy behind the counter: What is this stuff you're listening to?
"In Flames", he said. (I've heard of them!) "We've got some promo samplers. You want one?" Hey, sure... why the hell not? I took one. Listened to a song or two, was duly impressed... and then not. And then, that was that. I'd thought about picking up Soundtrack to Your Escape, but never got around to it, making a half-serious promise to myself that I'd look for it in the used bins.
Perhaps, I was just feeling burned after having picked up that new Barry Manilow a couple weeks ago. Maybe it was just the fact that Come Clarity was the only CD that looked vaguely interesting to me that particular week (and the $9.99 selling price certainly seemed forgiving). I now have an In Flames CD in my collection. And I have to say: I like it! I really, really like it! Almost as much as I like Sally Field! To my surprise as much as anyone else's, the disc has found a happy home in my car stereo; and even scarier, I've found myself humming a few of its tracks - actually watching the clock for the lunch hour to arrive to give me a chance to get back out to my car, curl up with a good book, and have my body and soul and eardrums destroyed by In Flames's righteous metal.
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I feel a little at a loss in trying to review this record. I have no real point of reference. I'm almost completely ignorant of the back-catalogue of this band; I've had little-to-no experience with the particular Gothenburg sound they emerged from (though images of shrieking gargoyles winging over a charcoal-black industrial city of permanent Medieval winter spring to mind). I feel a little like someone who, on a whim, has strolled into the local museum of contemporary art, stands awestruck, utterly confused and simultaneously riveted by a gigantic Gerard Richter canvas. Its thickness. Its layers. Its scale and its method. And I find myself reduced to the very simplest observations of what I hear:
I like it.
I like the crisp, powerful rhythms and the way, in songs like the opener "Take This Life" and "Leeches", they shift from a merciless thrash to something more controlled, more syncopated, and then back again, harder. I like the way the band creates a sense of space in their songs. The way the pounded rhythm guitars provide a framework for mastermind Jesper Stromblad's more intricate, harmonic leads, especially in the song "Pacing Death's Trail".
I like the weird Jekyll & Hyde act that vocalist Anders Friden does. In the verses, his voice is an indecipherable scream, void of both melody and message - a sound of pure, desperate energy - that at the choruses, in tandem with the rhythmic shifts from recklessness to control, morphs into something immediately identifiable as singing - momentarily clarified and pure enough to deliver a brief (and in the case of at least half a dozen of these songs, extremely effective) melodic hook before reverting back to its more feral self. And I like the fact that the few words we do hear and understand convey only enough to let our imaginations run wild with what they might be about - little evocative phrases that get stuck in your head - stay while and breathe me in - and echo there even as the sound makes mincemeat of our innards.
I admire the band's brevity. Most of these songs are delivered in modest bite sizes. Only one tops the five-minute mark, though there are several - "Reflect the Storm" and (especially) "Crawling Through Knives" - I wouldn't mind having gone longer. The latter boasts the album's strongest, most memorable chorus, effectively layering both of Friden's vocal incarnations - Dr. Frankenstein and his monster - one over the other as the song climaxes in its grand statement of self-empowerment:
It's in my hands
The sky, so bright it's burning
It's for me to decide
If flames will reach heaven tonight
I like the fact that for In Flames, intensity doesn't necessarily mean doom or violence or gratuitous angst.
There are things I definitely don't like about the record too. The title track veers dangerously close to late 80s arena-rock power ballad territory, and songs like "Scream" and "Versus Terminus" seem like self-conscious peace offerings to the gods of speed metal, to absolve the band of any sell-out charges leveled against them. "Dead End" annoys the heck out of me because it pollutes what might have been a song of tremendous speed and power by regressing to Evanescence-like verses sung by Swedish pop-songstress Lisa Miskovsky.
But in general, I likeCome Clarity by In Flames. Whether the strengths I perceive in the album are exceptional, I can't say with any authority. Is it better or worse than previous In Flames offerings. Got me! I'm totally clueless. Is my opinion of this album the most credible you're liable to get from this site? Absolutely not. Could I see myself buying more records by this band (and maybe others like them) in the future. Absolutely. But not right now. I'm too into this one at the moment.
All that said: next week, I will, by all means, review that new Captain & Tennille box set. I promise. You've all been warned.
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BECAUSE YOU NEED TO KNOW:
"Come Clarity" by In Flames
Ferret Music
Released 2/7/06
Produced by Anders Friden, Bjorn Gelotte, Jesper Stromblad
49 min.
SONGS: Take This Life - Leeches - Reflect The Storm - Dead End - Scream - Come Clarity - Vacuum - Pacing Death's Trail - Crawl Through Knives - Versus Terminus - Our Infinite Struggle - Vanishing Light - Your Bedtime Story is Scaring Everyone
Garnering a respectably sized international audience with 2004 s Soundtrack To Your Escape, Sweden s In Flames followed up two years later with anothe...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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