Flah said:
In Flames kind of loses me after Jester Race. I can still listen that record and enjoy every second. I can't say the same with Whoracle and Colony. They're good, but they don't have the same impact.
I can't make it through Clayman anymore. Reroute to Remain is okay and the band would've been okay if they kept heading down that direction, but they just kind of stopped dead in their tracks.
I definitely agree that Jester Race is the best album they've done. I do like Whoracle quite a bit though, and I think it is a clearcut step above Colony.
It's funny because I actually thought Soundtrack to Your Escape was a better album than Reroute to Remain overall. I found that the songs I like best from Reroute were the LEAST In Flames sounding songs...Cloud Connected, Dawn of a New Day, Metaphor. The songs where it seemed they tried to blend their old style w/ this new creation of theirs (such as Trigger) just didn't do it for me.
It seemed on Soundtrack they didn't even try to be the old-meets-new In Flames and just went into the "new direction" they seem to be set on going. I'm not saying Soundtrack is a good album by any means...listenable, yeah....but none of the tracks were standouts and when you look at what the band had previously released, it's all pretty much sub-par. In that regard, at least Reroute has some songs I liked quite a bit, as well as the ones I flat out didn't like.
In the end, it's just sad to see them release such a spectacular album (Jester Race) and get progressively worse from there. As much as I like Whoracle, it's not as good as Jester Race, and Colony and Clayman are a step below Whoracle, and so on.
I guess that's why I appreciate Dark Tranquillity so much. They just keep releasing solid albums (Haven maybe being the exception, although I still haven't heard the entire album so I can't pass judgement).