IN FLAMES // A Sculpture Remade In Clay

Clayman was the fifth album from Sweden’s monumentally influential melodic death metal band In Flames.

MORE: IN HEARTS WAKE: The Age Of Kaliyuga // DEFTONES: 20 Years Of White Pony // NORTHLANE: Live At The Roundhouse REVIEWS: BLUES PILLS: Holy Moly // NOFX/FRANK TURNER: West Coast Vs. Wessex // EMMURE: Hindsight // FANGZ: But No Thanks // IN HEARTS WAKE: Kaliyuga // PILLAGER: Forsaken Nation // SEETHER: Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum

It was the second to feature what could perhaps be described as their “classic” line-up, or at least the one that made the most albums together: guitarists Jesper Strömblad and Björn Gelotte, vocalist Anders Fridén, drummer Daniel Svenssen and bass player Peter Iwers.

Something of a breakthrough release for the band—it was their first after their North American live debut the previous year – Clayman marked the last In Flames album to subscribe to their original melodic death metal style. Significantly, electronics became more apparent in their music and there was a heightened groove element.

“We had electronic stuff in since about, I would say, [previous album] Colony”, says Björn Gelotte from his home in Sweden where he is once again able to enjoy watching football with a friend or two. “I’d say that’s when we started doing that, because we had loops and stuff that, while they might not be obvious, they were there. We love that element. It adds another level to the music, especially when it comes to the live performance, because it adds such a cool low end to it and it’s something that we always liked but we hadn’t really explored deeper. And then we started doing that.”

About to be released as a 20th anniversary package featuring new artwork, a 16-page booklet and four of the original 11 tracks re-recorded by the current line-up as bonuses, Clayman is the first In Flames album to be lavished with a celebratory edition. The band has simply either never thought of it, or been enjoying themselves too much, as Gelotte explains.

“There’s been a lot of touring, a lot of albums in between, and I guess, ‘Time flies when you’re having fun’ is really not a cliche. It’s absolutely true. We’ve had so much fun all these years that suddenly, it’s twenty years. I joined when they recorded [the 1995 EP] Subterranean,” he says, “and then it was Jester Race and that’s… Oh, 25 years ago! It’s been an ongoing thing. We never really took a break like this. We’ve never really celebrated our past, because we feel like we have that with us anyway!”

The pandemic-enforced hiatus has provided the Swedish road-dogs with the time they needed to concentrate on an anniversary release. It’s not only the 20th anniversary of Clayman but 30 years since the band began as a passion project for original guitarist Strömblad, who eventually left In Flames in 2010.

“We missed it on Lunar Strain and Subterranean, we missed it on Jester Race, on Whoracle and Colony, and then, we thought if we’re going to do it, let’s do it right, to quote Danko Jones,” Gelotte says with a chuckle. “If we’re going to do it, do it properly. Something fun and exciting, not just putting the same record out, saying it’s remastered. When we do things, we like to do it interesting and fun for us. Reimagining the artwork was one of the things that was really important for us.”

It’s not about what’s right or wrong, it’s about taste, and that’s something that us and every other band has – I wouldn’t say struggled with, because we don’t really care about it, but we’ve experienced it.
[ Björn Gelotte ]

The new cover is a stark contrast to the original, with Da Vinci’s Vetruvian Man rendered from an actual clay sculpture emerging from a dark background, and completely dispenses with the band’s old Jester Head mascot, all but abandoned on their album art for the past two decades until last year’s I, The Mask. In Flames were also at pains to add newer versions of some of the album’s songs as well, re-recorded with the current personnel that now includes Tanner Wayne on drums, bassist Bryce Paul Newman on bass and former Megadeth and Nevermore guitarist Chris Broderick alongside Gelotte and Fridén.

“This is a celebration of the album, so what we’re doing with the re-recordings is putting a little spin on it, more raw, the way we play them nowadays. A little glimpse into what’s happened with them. It was never meant to compete with the original, and people seem to misunderstand that. It was a bit of a landmark for us, this album, and as far as I can remember from twenty years ago, quite fun to record!”

The In Flames sound of today is as different to that of Clayman as the album’s new cover is to the original, and carries only distant echoes of that presented on 1994’s Lunar Strain, which features none of the band’s 2020 line-up.

“I think for a lot of purists and old school fans of a band, it’s really hard for a band to do something without people complaining or not understanding it,” Gelotte reasons. “It’s the nature of it. Music is, at a certain level, going to be about taste. It’s not about what’s right or wrong, it’s about taste, and that’s something that us and every other band has – I wouldn’t say struggled with, because we don’t really care about it, but we’ve experienced it.”

Clayman carried the portent of musical change from In Flames. Leaving their death metal sound behind them and achieving a higher level of recognition and success came at the cost of legions of early fans who still can’t forgive them. The very title of the next album, Reroute to Remain, pointed to a new direction informed by late-90s American metal instead of Strömblad’s original “death metal with Iron Maiden melodies” vision. Björn Gelotte offers no apologies for that.

“This cool premise that we’ve always had is that we decide what we’re going to play, and we wanted to play that. Some people might not like that, and I get it! [The changes are] very subtle on Clayman compared to what we did later on, because we found different ways to express it. But it had been a fundamental part of our sound for a very long time, but if people don’t like it and wonder what the fuck we did, well, our other albums are still there. We didn’t take them away so no one could listen to them anymore.”