By Ben Richardson
In 1994, as most of the musical world mourned the death of Kurt Cobain, a humble band from Gothenburg, Sweden, released an album called Lunar Strain, which would go on to help situate the sleepy Scandinavian university town at the center of a swirling metal maelstrom. The band was In Flames, and their incendiary interpretation of the nascent death metal genre would go on to spawn a legion of imitators on both sides of the Atlantic.
The fulcrum of the In Flames sound was a keen ear for neoclassical melody, which they fused seamlessly with the groovy thrash ‘n’ roll that defined the Swedish Death scene at the time. This penchant for soaring arpeggios and Iron Maiden-style close-harmony leads made their music accessible, adaptable, and widely popular. Subsequent LP’s The Jester Race and Whoracle won critical and fan acclaim.
Six years and five albums later, the fire had begun to dwindle. The band had undergone numerous lineup changes, and a seismic sonic shift had been set in motion. By the release of 2000’s Clayman, In Flames was experimenting with slower tempos and crunchier, dumbed-down riffs, while retaining enough soaring leads and double-bass gallop to keep their fanbase placated. 2002’s Reroute to Remain was a different story, a galling stumble into gussied-up nü-metal pablum that introduced triggered trip-hop drumbeats and vocalist Anders Friden’s ghastly embrace of both clean singing and dreadlocks