Okay, that could be interpreted as kind of a sarcastic post title. But I didn’t really mean it the way you think. You’ll see — it’s a play on words.
I actually am faithful to In Flames. They were my gateway to extreme metal, years ago. Here at NCS, we weren’t terribly thrilled with their last album, but that hasn’t stopped us from getting up for the new one, Sounds of A Playground Fading, which will be released between June 17 and June 24, depending on where you live.
Yesterday, Century Media released the first single from the album in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, and it will be available for purchase on iTunes and elsewhere in North America on May 10. It’s called “Deliver Us”, and of course the thing is already up on YouTube — which means it’s now on our site (after the jump).
The days of Whoracle and Clayman are of course long gone — “Deliver Us” doesn’t constitute a revival of that style. But I do like the track. Quite melodic, of course, with pulsing keyboards in the mix and a catchy main riff. Clean singing in the chorus, of course, but the chorus is staying in our heads. I’m finding this a step up from the last album. What do you think? (Hear the song after the jump.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ9zvsmX9iU
23 Responses to ““DELIVER US” FROM IN FLAMES”
Leave a Reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
Catchy chorus, that’s for damn sure. Sadly that’s really all I’m feeling here….
I do wish the song had more of an edge, more heaviness to counterbalance the chorus. It could have been better.
I like it. Definitely a step up from ASOP. The difference is now they aren’t making any excuses and trying to remain heavy. I think this song sounds closer to Maiden than any of their other stuff. Didn’t they list Maiden as an influence? Catchy, but not the epitome of melodeath.
This, from Wikipedia, citing a 2002 interview: “Jesper Strömblad formed In Flames to write music that combined the melodic guitar style of Iron Maiden with the brutality of death metal, something which Jesper stated he had never heard any band do.”
Clearly, the brutality is now gone, along with much of the non-melodic rhythm riffing in evidence on older albums. It’s tough to find any two IF albums that sound the same; they’ve clearly been evolving, almost from the beginning. Now, they seem to have a “been there, done that” attitude toward melodic death metal. Fair enough, but I’m still trying to re-adjust to where they’re going musically. I’m not there yet. 🙂
The vocals are head and shoulders above ANYTHING off ASOP.
That’s my two bits.
Totally agree!
Not bad, but it misses a crunch.
Totally agree with that, too.
hmmm, im going to wait untill the album comes out, i dont want to pre-judge it based on this song, wich did not really click, and i was not expecting that from in flames, guess ill have to listen to it a couple more times maybe ill end up enjoying it.
Listening more is a good idea. I’ve been doing that, and it’s growing on me — but there’s no telling what the rest of the album will be like. I’m still holding my breath, thinking about what Anders said in an interview back in March:
“We have some songs that pretty much go against the hard rock formula. There’s a song called ‘The Attic’ where we have an accordion playing the chorus instead of me singing it. Another song begins with a spoken-word part that evolves into a kind of hard DEPECHE MODE-type thing. We also have some really fast, typical IN FLAMES tunes.
He added, “We’ve never denied where we come from, but at the same time we like to challenge our listeners.” Don;t know if I want this challenge or not. 🙂
It’s decent. They could work on a more interesting song structure.
It’s fine for what it is. Though they have to be careful, or they’ll sound like Nickelback soon. And I’m too much of a douchebag elitist to say that there’s nothing wrong with that.
Maybe it’ll be a crossover drug, like pot, only instead of doing lines of coke off an 80 year old hookers ass, the newly addicted fool will end up moshing to Wormrot. Which would, fortunately, negate the fool part.
Wellsir, I think you’ve found a place for this music: the new metal crossover drug. We can give it to our non-metal friends who are thinking about dipping their toes into the waters of metal. Now we just have to figure out the drug ladder in between IF and Wormrot, cuz otherwise that step in between them will be a doozy.
And how did Nickelback get to be such a punching bag for metalheads?
I’m pretty sure it goes In Flames, Amon Amarth, Deicide, Wormrot.
Or something like that….
Re Nickelback: By fucking existing.
Seriously though, to be fair, they are radio rock. They never tried to be metal, and it’s a bit absurd to judge them by any standard than the radio rock standard.
That said, whenever I hear them, I wanna stab the singer in the throat via his eye. With a solidified rat tail.
I’ll admit that I liked them in 2001 or whatever. I’m probably just fronting, and if I gave them an unbiased listen, I might not even hate them or anything. But like I said: I’m a douchebag.
Since we’re making embarrassing confessions, I also kind of liked Nickelback when they first appeared, which is why I asked the punching-bag question. That was back when I used to listen to other kinds of music in addition to metal. For better or worse, those days are gone. I guess I’m a douchebag too.
I’m liking your drug-ladder suggestion, though I think there needs to be an intermediate step between Amon Amarth and Deicide. Maybe one between current IF and Amon Amarth, too. If we wanna get people from “experimenting” with weed to full-fledged crack ho’s, we gotta make this progression subtle.
I tried really hard with ASOP, I really did, it failed on all levels. From someone who used to be an absolutely huge IF fan, I’ve met them twice and seen them live roughly 15 times, I’ve actually lost count. I like most am a fan of their 90’s work, but the only way to listen to them now as is a band that are not IF but as band that takes influence from the IF we all used to know and love, I listened to that disconnected from the old and as if it was a band I had never heard before, on that level, it ain’t too shabby and as I result I will happily listen to the new album when it comes out.
Good way to approach this. It’s true of other bands, too — bands who’ve changed their styles over time. If your mind continues to compare them to what they used to be, you’re disappointed. But if you can forget who they are and just consider the music as if it were coming from some new band, it’s something you’d like. Some musicians make this easier to do — they start side projects when they want to make a different kind of music, while preserving the sound of the original band, so fans really are listening to a different band.
From this song it’s not far removed from the side project that Anders did with Niklas Engelin called Passenger, not sure if you’ve heard of it but I really enjoyed that album, there was always meant to be a follow up to the debut but it never saw the light of day sadly.
The other thing with IF is if they did decide to go back to the Colony/Whoracle days they could never recapture that magic, it would without a doubt be a disappointment. I think the only way to truly satisfy the old school fans would to be to do a tour solely based on their early work.
I’ve never even heard of Passenger, so thanks for that education. Very astute point about how difficult it would be for IF to recapture the magic of the early albums — and actually that may be the best answer to IF fans (including me) who continue to protest, with varying degrees of stridency, IF’s drift toward a land in between MDM and hard rock.
“Passenger” has a kind of dreamy, romatinc Depeche Mode -type quality to a lot of it.
There were some really great songs on it though. I’m particularly partial to “Circles” and “I Die SLowyl ” (which has an upbeat, Sentenced-style quality to its suicidal lyrics).
I always felt tha the first Engel album was the closest continuation from the first (and only) Passenger record myself.
How does “Threnody” compare to the first Engel? Threnody is the only one I’ve heard (and I did like that album).
I’d say “Threnody” is a real improvement. Everything’s just a bit stronger and more focussed than on the debut, which was occasionally lacking in conviction and/or sonic clout.
The new IN FLAMES video for “Deliver Us“ will be premiered on http://new.music.yahoo.com.