Reroute to Remain

Gimme a M! Gimme an A! Gimme a L! Gimme another L! Gimme a C! Gimme an O! Gimme a R! Gimme an E!

What does that spell? IN FLAMES!!

In Flames keeps the streak alive by making an album ever worse than the last one I reviewed, which I didn't think was possible, but again I have been proven wrong here. In Shits is alive and kicking.

In fact, I have figured out the formula for making an In Flames album. I share it with you here in the hopes that if everybody knows how they do it, it won't seem so special anymore:

1) Start out with a cool intro. It doesn't matter whether it's a nice-sounding riff or a classy fade-in-guitars type sound, as long as it makes you think that maybe THIS is the song that will be decent, for a change.

2) Pull that cool opening out completely after no longer than 45 seconds. Have Daniel Svensson come in on drums by playing whatever the fuck he feels like hammering out, regardless of whether it actually fits with the song.

3) Bring Anders Fridén in on vocals to make the song even more of a train wreck. DO NOT let the song end until Anders has pounded it into a pile of mush.

4) Three options here:

a) Start pounding on all of the instruments and blasting out whatever mallcore shit the band can come up with on the fly to keep costs down;
b) Take that cool main melody in the beginning and play it over and over and over and over and over again until the listener wants to fucking kill himself with a carrot peeler;
c) Do both.

5) Repeat steps 1-4 until you have a full album of pure pig feces.

The formula is used successfully many times in the new album. Most of these songs have exactly the same problems as the other albums--shitty vocals, mallcore guitar playing, a pussy bass and completely irrelevant drum playing. Notable songs are System, where the shitty vocals start immediately; Trigger, where the band pulls some clean vocals straight out of their ass and Metaphor, which is the reason this album doesn't make double digits; namely, that the cool opening riff (which ends up being the entire song, by the way) is bastardized from ONE OF THEIR OWN SONGS! They didn't even have the decency to rip off a good band like Iron Maiden or Judas Priest; instead, the take the opening riff from Moonshield, bastardize it, and turn it into the entire song. My God.

Oh, and in my continuing observations of the increasing shittiness of Mr. Anders Fridén, I am pleased to report that our favorite vocalist has hit a new low. Realizing that neither death vocals nor doom vocals seem to be working for him, Anders has attempted to sing black vocals on this album, with even less success than the doom vocals on Clayman. May I suggest to Mr. Fridén that perhaps his calling lies with a brotherhood of monks who swear an oath of silence upon entry into the monastery?

This album sucks. Big surprise. It's the worst piece of rat-infested cow pus that I've ever had the misfortune of hearing. Even bigger surprise. Just stay away. I don't know how many times I have to review this band before you people get it, but stay away. When you listen to In Flames, you lose.