Artist: In Flames
Label: Nuclear Blast
Release Date: 4/6/04
Listen to the track "The Quiet Place" (Courtsey of Nuclear Blast)
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Title: Soundtrack To Your Escape Artist: In Flames Label: Nuclear Blast Release Date: 4/6/04 |
Judgment Committee Reviews | Rating |
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4 | ||
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2 | ||
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Listen to the track "The Quiet Place" (Courtsey of Nuclear Blast) | |||
Abyss's Review:
Alright, I admit it. There is a big part of me that wanted to slag this record all to hell before I even heard it. Then I heard its title, Soundtrack To Your Escape, and I thought that it might even be my duty to rip this album apart. Yes, I did say duty. Let's get the giggles out of the way and continue on... Very good. I then looked at the track listing. "Dial 595-Escape"? "Borders and Shading"? "Evil In A Closet"? Let's just say I don't know about evil, but something should come out of the closet...
"One word review: Good." I never really thought I'd ever look back and think Whoracle and Clayman were good album titles. But I digress... I guess the biggest surprise is that In Flames' new album is actually not that bad. The band is continuing in the direction they went with Reroute to Remain, but they seem much more comfortable with themselves this time around, and that makes a big difference when it comes to the overall effect of the record. There are a handful of pretty cool songs on this album, evident right from the beginning with opening track "F(r)iend." Now I'm not going to try to get you to believe it's a return to the glory days, cause that just ain't going to happen. But it does, like the other heavier songs on the record, invoke some of the better themes on Clayman (and perhaps a tiny bit of Whoracle sprinkled on top); namely a driving, but accessible, riff that has just enough grit under its 'bounce' to make it cool. And, predictably, these are the areas of the album that are most successful.
The more 'melodic' songs (read: softer) on the record are less consistent. To their credit, the band seems much more confident with their less aggressive songs than the comparable tragedies on Reroute, so there has been a great deal of improvement. That acknowledgment aside, they still aren't very good at the softer stuff. Anders now does a much more competent impression of Korn's Jonathan Davis. The 'clean' vocals borrow directly from the nu metal frontman's 'whimper/whine into an emotive scream' thing, but Anders' voice isn't nearly as charismatic as Mr. Davis' and the songs generally lose some energy as a result.
So, all in all, In Flames have come out with a pretty good record. I don't doubt I'll return to it every once in awhile, but it will be a guilty pleasure. I sincerely doubt that the disenfranchised fans will be coming back with this release, but it would be a lie to say it isn't a marked improvement. Unfortunately, this band just doesn't seem to realize where their strengths lie. One word review: Good.
Death's Review:
As popular as In Flames became while touring and promoting their last album, Reroute to Remain, they also seem to have pissed off a lot of people. In Flames are underground metalheads' new favorite whipping target, joining a long tradition of metal heroes branded "sellouts" a la Metallica, Paradise Lost, etc. Such it was that before I even heard Soundtrack to Your Escape myself, literally months before the street release, I was already hearing a significant negative buzz about this new In Flames album. Given the fact that both Clayman and especially Reroute to Remain had shown dramatic evolutions in the In Flames sound, away from the traditional "Gothenburg"-style melodic death metal (by the way, notice you don't really much hear anyone talking about the Gothenburg sound anymore?), taking on much more experimental goth/electronic stylings and employing Depeche Mode-style whiny clean vocals in significant doses, I was prepared for the worst. In fact, I expected it.
"It really is good, in fact it may even take a step back from the experimenting, moving a touch back to the core In Flames sound." Then I actually listened to the album for myself. And trust me, it's not that bad. If you have been with In Flames this long, if - like me - you are one of the few underground metal fans that actually liked Reroute to Remain, then you will love this new record. It really is good, in fact it may even take a step back from the experimenting, moving a touch back to the core In Flames sound. Not dramatically, but a bit. There are a good three or four songs that really rip with serious ferocity, and there are moments when the old-school In Flames fury is back, like on opener "F(r)iend," which blazes with all-out metallic attack. Track two, "The Quiet Place," sounds like it probably is the single/video, but even songs like this that are more commercial still have a certain undeniable catchiness that is uniquely "In Flames" and I can't help but like them.
The bottom line is that In Flames are always changing yet always retain a certain quality that make them the band they are, and Soundtrack to Your Escape is quite consistent in that regard. If you want to hate this you'll find your ammunition but probably not as much as you thought you would. If you want to like it you'll enjoy a fun new record. Nothing earth-shattering here, just more well-produced late-era In Flames studio materal that sounds good coming out of your speakers and features songs that will stick in your head even when they aren't making it bang up and down with reckless abandon.
Hel's Review:
Once, I was the most loyal fan to be found. My favorite bands were my favorite bands, and that was just that. I still feel this way about most of the bands I call "favorites" but some of them, well, let's just say they've fallen out of favor. In Flames is an excellent example. There was a time, not so long ago, when they could do no wrong. Then came Reroute to Remain. I tolerated it at the time, but was vastly disappointed. After seeing them perform live several times in support of that record, my distaste for that material grew and grew. So it was with great trepidation that I put Soundtrack to your Escape into my player.
"If you loved the last one, then you must be the one they made this record for..." The first track, "F(r)iend," kicks the album off strongly, showing that the band does indeed know what their old fans are looking for, and gave me hope that perhaps this album would be good after all. Track two, "The Quiet Place," took that hope and firmly dashed it, vividly illustrating that while the band could still deliver the kind of songs people like me want to hear, they choose to favor their newer style yet again. And what's so wrong with this newer style, you ask? Well, for me, the problem centers on the clean vocals that seem to have become increasingly prominent. I have no issues with good clean vocals mind you - but Anders' clean vocals are not good. Please stop, Anders! These vocals are whiney and annoying, and at this stage, I'd rather listen to fingernails grating against a chalkboard.
Fully half of the songs contain clean vocals. The other half seem to be free of them and those songs are tolerable. I wish my CD player were programmable, so that I could skip over the undesirable tracks - perhaps then I would enjoy this album more. In a side-by-side comparison, this may perhaps be a slightly better record than Reroute, but my tolerance for the clean vocal sections has gone the way of the dodo and I am having a much harder time swallowing them this time around. Further, I just don't feel that the rest of the songs have the same ferocity that defined their masterful older works. These factors combined cause me to be unhappy with this album as a whole.
I have spent a great deal of time beating myself up over how to score this one. I've painstaking forced myself to listen to every track over and over, trying to be objective. And I find myself constantly coming back with a score of about 2.5. Half skulls are not acceptable under our rating system, however, and this is where I keep getting stuck. I find half the album to be in the tolerable to good range, while the other half is utterly intolerable, therefore 2.5... Despite the pangs of leftover loyalty that make it difficult for me to do so, my deep bitterness forces me to drop it down to a 2. I think that if you found Reroute unacceptable then you won't like this either, as it has many of the same issues. However, if you loved the last one, then you must be the one they made this record for...
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