Metal Reviews

Bah, it's all just excuses for liking the latest In Flames offering.

You know what, I was thinking the same thing. People are getting things out of their asses for liking this album. Making up things that aren't there like a return to form, and why can't I hear it ? Admit that you like this fucking mainstream piece of crap and move on, I says.

You can't hear it because you're not listening. You're hearing, but not listening. Regardless, it's not a return to form, but they've definitely brought back a lot of the old school stuff that's been missing.

I would bet money if we could change history and this album came out after Clayman there would be no complaints. Soundtrack To You Escape seems to have tainted the water a bit, left a bitter taste in everyones' mouths.

They can have no complaints about that.

When Clayman came out I was like "hmm, are they mellowing out ?" but most people were like "In Flames we Trust", I know because I was already a fan. But when RTR came out I said they sold out. If this album came out back then I would also say they sold out. Clayman was showing signs of it even though it was good, RTR nailed the coffin for me, not STTYE and so would this album.

Sold out to who? The mainstream metal, as opposed to melodeath? Well, excuse me, but isn't that the same thing?

haha, possibly. Varg thought swedish death was mainstream in 1991, maybe it's been enough time for that thought to propogate.

In Flames are particularly sellouty though.. although I don't like Melodeath I recognise that bands like DT and Arsis still have plenty of credibility.

I couldn't give a rat's arse if my favourite metal bands made a million bucks a day, in fact I wish them all the best. So long as they keep making great records.

Yet they're still pretty underground compared to Arch Enemy or The Haunted.

In Flames made an obvious change to try and go mainstream. They succeeded in that th ey are more well known, get some videos on MTV2 and are a more familiar name in America. There are other bands that have changed and not gone downhill. In flames changed everything they were about musically. I understand the fact that bands want to make money...and the good ones should. The problem with that is that generally speaking people love shitty music. The shittier and simpler the better. For any good metal band to get popular they have to suck. There has been no great technical band that has ever made it big. Dream Theater is the biggest tech band around and they arent all that tech anymore. Maiden is probably the biggest metal band ever but they were never technical, and they were only big in a metal sense and not in a popular sense. My sister and her firends have no idea who Maiden is. Many of the people on this forum like the more experimental, tech, exteme side of things. None of these bands will ever make it big. TO make money you must suck to appeal to the masses sucky musical tastes. As soon as a band makes a change in order to make money their music will always get worse. I cant get angry at this but I do get disappointed and i abandon the band.

This is about right.

I'd love it if my favourite bands made money and got to quit their crappy day jobs as a reward for being so great (they could also tour more and stuff), but the fact is to appeal to the biggest portion of consumers these days, you generally have to suck.

You saying melodic death metal = mainstream ? You should know better than that. Ask 1000 In Flames fans that became fans later than 2002 if they know about At the Gates, 50 of them will probably know about it.

Yes. At The Gates et al are the next step for the new generation of metalcore fans, and there's hardly any difference in their sounds. You unestimate people, the ones that can get into metalcore's relative harshness know enough to explore the genre, and melodeath's very easy -> Soilwork, Arch Enemy, etc.

I knew this would turn into an argument.

Bah, nonsense. Unless these mallcore kiddies start digging into the metal history (which is unlikely) they won't know ATG and they'll keep listening to what's handed to them as the new cool shit which is IF. What's the next step after melodeath for them, grindcore ?

Bands like Maiden and Priest are well-known to them, why not Napalm Death, etc? You generalize too much.

Edit: magazines, radio shows (at least in this country) will tell them things like that. Sure, the majority of teenage girls at a HIM concert may be there for Ville, but there's a minority who like the music. OK, bad example, but you know what I mean.

Everybody generalizes when it comes to mallcore, you just fail to see that they are not grincore fans in training. Maybe some of them will develop a taste, but it isn't exactly the next step for all of them.

As I said, metalcore is heavy enough to put the mallcore kids off (yes, they are two different things), and if they can get into the growling/shrieking of Cradle and Killswitch, why not the more metal bands? IF is a good mid-point for them, even if they don't all go on to like Watchmaker and early Carcass.

because that's not where they're headed. they're headed wherever their favourite magazine tells them to go next..

*cynic

*correct

Ever read Metal Hammer? At the end, there's an "Extreme" bit, which has info on bands like Darkthrone, Burzum, underground stuff. That was eventually what got me into it, out of sheer curiosity, and what I found blew my mind. It may be a worthless shit-rag, but it gets people further in, and is better than Kerrang for that purpose. So they get told to go, that's what happens whenever you or me recommend a band to someone, we're telling them to check the band out. What difference does it make who heads them that way, long as they go along it?