In Flames - The Jester Race Reveiw

With Lunar Strain In Flames had given the Metal world exactly what it needed. They gave Heavy Metal a shot in the arm and created a completly new genre in the process. Out of the woodwork came bands like Dark Tranquility, Children of Bodom, and Amon Amarth and Gothenburg sweden became home to one of the biggest Metal movements since the Thrash Metal movement of the mid-late 80s. Now everyone had one question on their mind. How would In Flames follow up Lunar Strain? They got their answer in 1996 when In Flames released "The Jester Race". Let me start off by saying that this album is the album that is considered to be In Flames masterpeice. While I dont nessecarily agree with that, I do agree that the album is brilliant. From the opening notes of "Moonsheild" you can tell this is going to be an epic album. In Flames take everything that they did on Lunar Strain and expand it here. The guitar melodies are more epic sounding and they harmonize alot more with each other. The rythym guitar parts sound massive and they layer perfectly over the rythym section of bass and drums. The songs are better written with acoustic interludes and the odd talking part by Anders Friden who is a much better vocalist. The music is complex and the lyrics meaningfull. It seems like In Flames have done nothing wrong right? Wrong. There are 2 faults of this album one of which In Flames could do nothing about. The first fault is the mixing of the vocals. They are swamped by all the other music thats going on around them making them hard to hear. This is a big deal seeing as the production got better on later albums. The second fault which really isnt this albums fault, is that they improved everything on The Jester Race on later albums as well creating some of the most perfect albums I have ever heard! But that said this is an amazing albums that has nearly no issues therefore earning itself a 9.5/10. I strongly reccomend this album if your going to listen to In Flames but dont know where to start.