09-18-09.

Spokane, WA.

The children… Wow, the children.

Standing in line for an hour and a half (venue set-up time fail is made of fail), it became apparent that we were in the minority of attendees over the age of 21. Significantly over, mind you. I’m not sure how to feel about that- in part it’s kind of disappointing to not look around and see an amalgamation of At the Gates, Dark Tranquillity, Soilwork and other such classic Gothenburg bands plastered onto shirts, but instead a lot of young, clean-shaven chitlins wearing very new looking In Flames apparel. Granted, there were enough respectable newer names (Amon Amarth, Killswitch, etc), but standing in line for a show from one of the original melodic death metal bands, it felt as though their origins were some distant land that the crowd wasn’t aware of. But scenes change. Quite frankly, I’m happy to see a mob of kids into In Flames, regardless of which incarnation it is.

The Faceless takes stage. I haven’t been privy to anything approaching true death metal on stage (or even influenced by it) in a long while, so just the sheer brutality was enough to leave me smiling for the first few minutes. Properly mixed heaviness is something to appreciate: the double-bass wasn’t moving my clothing, but it was enough “oomph” that you knew somebody’s feet were plugging away at lightning speed behind the kit. Guitars that aren’t made of mud, vocals that aren’t under-mixed… Wonderful. But this isn’t generic death metal- despite the vocalist’s Cannibal Corpse shirt. Somewhere between the second or third song I found myself in some sort of trance, alternating between members in admiration. It’s easy to forget how much skill this brand of music requires when it’s not crushing your face from 40 feet in front of you. Playing at hyper-speed, rapidly changing times and tempo (making it look absolutely effortless), yet still maintaining moments of groove and (thankfully) having a vocalist who knew what he was doing with his throat (or rather, not doing). Definitely a proper start to the evening.

240 pounds of man, scuzzy hair down to his shoulders, and a beard scruffy enough to compete with most bums. Denim jacket covered in patches. The sort of man that, very clearly, drinks a lot of beer. Grooving riffage pours out of the amps for the opening song. He opens his mouth. Out comes falsetto. This is 3 Inches of Blood. By all accounts they’re pretty straightforward metal- nothing terribly original, but definitely the sort of group that gets on stage with the intention of having a good time so that, by proximity, you will too. Great fun to watch, and it IS most certainly something to behold- anyone that can pull off Halford-esque falsetto in true form deserves recognition, even if it’s not typically my listening preference.

Five guys wander onto the stage, mostly clean-cut and looking straight off any college campus (mostly; the guitarist in a sleeveless Opeth tee threw things a bit). Set-up takes a little longer than it should considering things are already an hour behind, but soon it gets underway. A thick wall of noise and energy issues forth. Between the Buried & Me. I have to admit, after the first two openers, my ears were starting to disagree that the high-end of the audio spectrum existed anymore, so things got fairly muddy during their set as far as I could tell. Whether that was a set-up issue or my dying hearing, I’m not sure. Either way, as with The Faceless, these are class musicians. I probably spent most of their set in awe of the bassist- very rarely during any sort of metal is the bass doing anything independent of the guitar, but he absolutely kicked that stereotype out the window. Which was to be expected- BTB&M definitely put the prog into progressive death metal, moving not only between various metal genres (death, thrash, metalcore), but also into some strange variation of psychedelic prog-rock, complete with clean vocals (which I thought were on the strained-side; as if over-compensating for being low in the mix). It can be (and for me personally was) very hard to keep up with, considering I don’t know their material very well. And it seemed like it would all be cut short as they announced “this is our last song for the night”, seemingly early in the set. Not true. Fifteen minutes later, they wrap up White Walls to a crowd of screaming In Flames fans, by far one of the standout tracks of the entire evening. It had been awhile since I’d listened to Colors (the album), but having gone back just now to hear it again, as awesome as it is, that build at 7:20 is nothing until you hear it live. Just jaw-dropping, and it was great seeing a sea of young metalheads that agreed.

So all the openers are down, and we all know what’s next. Understandably, it takes In Flames a fair bit longer to set-up, what with being the headliner and having brought their own (blinding) light show. Not that this stops a handful of dunces from chanting the band’s name in moronic feverency; yeah, let’s just skip the sound check, great idea.

Lights drop, a teaser loop of the very distinct synth from Cloud Connected comes on, band takes the stage, and things kick into full gear from there. Here’s the setlist to the best of my remembrance:

Cloud Connected
Embody the Invisible
Pinball Map
Disconnected
Delight and Angers
The Hive
Alias
Crawl Through Knives
Square Nothing
Leeches
System
Drifter
Come Clarity
Clayman
The Mirror’s Truth
Take This Life
The Quiet Place
Reflect The Storm
My Sweet Shadow

I have to say, the first third of the setlist surprised the living shit out of me (and anyone familiar with the band before 2002 likely was as well). Embody The Invisible? The Hive? I was prepared to hear one, maybe two songs from anything Clayman and before- not this, and especially not within the first half of the set.

…Before pressing on, I’d like to take this moment to air some thoughts on what’s obviously coming here: I love In Flames. Everything from Jester Race through A Sense of Purpose. In metal circles- particularly ones that respect the early Gothenburg scene- that’s tantamount to coming out of the closet. At a bar full of loggers. In rural Montana. I saw it plenty of times on Metal Forums and it usually turned into a flame war. But I realized something at this show: In Flames- in both forms- has colored a huge part of my life since Junior High: Embody the Invisible and Brush the Dust Away were staples of my mp3 collection ever since I started thieving my brother’s music collection, I can’t count the number of times I listened to Clayman while working out (hah) or driving to school- same with Reroute To Remain, which was one of the first real “metal” albums to lyrically impact me as a young teenager. My point is, I could separate In Flames into two different bands if I wanted too, but to me, it’s one band with different qualities, and whether it’s the beautiful dueling solos and seething vocal rage of them in the Colony-era or the grove oriented riffage, vulnerable clean vocals and screams of post-RtR, I enjoy it. Period.

Anyways, as much as I’d like to think everyone is capable of that duality of opinion, it’s just not so. There was the obligatory man behind me that shouted for “Biosphere” (hadurr), very obviously wasn’t going to get his way (three more followed from Come Clarity and Sense of Purpose; I giggle), and left. And most of the folks up front nodded politely along to stuff like Clayman and The Hive, while getting all sorts of into Delight and Angers and Quiet Place. But that’s fine, there were plenty of us pleased with everything.

Also worth mentioning are some Anders-isms:

- Early in the set he was talking to the crowd, stopped mid-sentence and asked a man up front if he was “filming this for YouTube”, told him not to lie, asked for the man’s camera, and pulled it on-stage, panning around the crowd (“say hi to YouTube Spokane”) and back to his face to rapturous applause. Lucky bastard.

- “You guys on the balcony need to kick those old people, get them moving around.”

- “I love you Anders!” – some woman from the balcony. “I love you, and I want to impregnate you.” – Anders

- (introducing Come Clarity) “This one is for all you Scorpions fans, because Scorpions are the greatest band in the world!” as he grinned half at us and half at Bjorn (who shook his head in disgust).

And so things went- they pounded through each song with all the ease of a band that’s been at this for nearly twenty years, clearly still having a blast with every bit of their material. Even Anders, whom I’ve doubted in the past as having a good voice live, hit all his choruses and perfectly balanced his early growling with his newer screaming (something I feel he did on the latest album as well).

They close with My Sweet Shadow. I get lost in Ander’s screams, the band’s enthusiasm for a song that’s always been intense for me. It doesn’t reek of “live closer”, but somehow, it’s fitting: An oddly emotive synth line, start-stop riffing, and a quiet build-up to a soaring chorus. Perfect ender.

So we piled out the door, content (“that was a fucking outstanding show” – some girl, as we were leaving). At least I was, what with my revelation and all. I always thought of In Flames as a band I casually listen to, but for whatever reason I could never admit that wasn’t true. Letting the raw emotion of a live show wash over, it was retardedly obvious just how untrue that is. I’m a fan, no exceptions.

And nothing is more metal than kicking off a three hour drive at 1:30 in the morning, armed with energy drinks and Lee’s “diverse” taste of keep-me-from-hallucinating-shit-while-driving music, then sleeping for a solid (!) two hours on a couch before a full next day (including another 3 hours of driving).

Yeah.

I need more weekends like this.

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