Individual Thought Patterns

Just two years after releasing probably their best album from their career with the best line-up, it was of course rather predictable that the next album could not live up to expectations. The quality of musicianship however was still here but on a different level and mr Schuldiner did present us some very impressive new riffs and melodies on ‘Individual Thought Patterns’.

The start of ‘Overactive imagination’ was impressive but the rhythmical midpaced verses do the composition some damage. Same goes for the unimpressive chorus. The solo of lead guitarist Andy LaRocque however is quite good and melodic and really has that King Diamond feeling. In the end it also turned out to be LaRoques best solo on the album.

The rhythmical experimentation continues on ‘In Human Form’ and the song never really leaves the ground to take a flight to immortality. ‘Jealousy’ does a slightly better job at that. Again rhythmical verses but this time saved by impressive riffing. The slowed down section with the fretless bass-slide however is pretty horridly jazzy. The song is saved by the uptempo chorus that has a mighty main riff. The moshing part after the chorus had some good work DiGiorgio on bass. ‘Trapped in a Corner’ has the same flaws as ‘In Human Form’, being those rhythmical verses that are getting annoying by now. ‘Nothing is Everything’ uses the same trick as 'Jealousy', namely having an impressive chorus that saves the song. This time the chorus doesn’t have a riff but a beautiful twin harmony. Nice touch!

‘Mentally Blind’ finally has a normal verse with midpaced drums that don’t demand all the attention. The bridge is sped up and the slowpaced chorus has a nice guitar melody and vocal line following each other. The middle section of the song is pretty amazing, building up to a midpaced double bass climax on with all musicians excel in tightness. The title track 'Individual Thought Pattern' has a nice uptempo syncopated verse but the rest of the song shares the same flaws with ‘In Human Form’ and ‘Trapped in a Corner’. Now ‘Destiny’ starts rather nicely with a clean intro and solo. The following break could have come straight from ‘Spiritual Healing’ and the verse sustains this heaviness. The half assed melodic bridge and rhythmical chorus however are extremely poor and quite ruin the song.

‘Out Of Touch’ has more straightforward verses and therefore becomes a pretty decent track at times with some nice uptempo touches and this time the rhythms and eerie riffing on the chorus work out nicely. The long middle section however does the song some damage and the twin harmonic riff leading to the solo is rather dull for Schuldiner standards. The immediate classic ‘The Philosopher’ was a blend of the ‘Spiritual Healing’ and ‘Human’ styles and remains one of Schuldiners strongest slowpaced compositions ever.

The album had an overdose of rhythmical verses that made the album sound rather formulaic. Also the standard ‘verse, chorus, middle section, verse, chorus’ structure was getting annoyingly predictable by now. The faster parts of the album are the best since they contain some real power and most of the best riffs and melodies on the album. The production was a step back from ‘Human’ being less heavy and having a slightly less enjoyable crunchy guitar sound.

Why Gene Hoglan made such a mess of it is hard to say. Possibly he wanted to do something else than in his later Dark Angel years. But this was too much of a change all of a sudden. He could and should have given the album much more speed and power. Instead he was experimenting too much for his own ego. I am really a Dark Angel fan but after hearing ‘Individual Thought Pattern’ I was screaming for Sean Reinert. And, however good mr Laroque is, I also missed Masvidal with his heavy sound and solos for they suited Death so much more.