InMe get a bizarre amount of attention these days. Considering the fact that, throughout most of their puzzlingly long career, they have either been derided as a bubblegum pop metal act or completely ignored by pretty much everyone in existence, their recent resurgence in the British alternative guitar scene has come as rather unexpected. With well-received festival slots and tours since their last full-length, 2009’s “Herald Moth”, the Dave McPherson led Essex quartet are firmly back on the radar ahead of this new release, “The Pride”.
First impressions are important when buying a record. Now I am not suggesting that your average InMe is a vinyl connoisseur who sees the artwork as being one of the most important deciding factors in their purchase BUT the cover for this album is one of the worst things I have ever seen in my life. It looks like the sort of thing I’d expect a bunch of nine year old comic book fans to flock to and literally no one else. I mean for a record that could really make or break the resurgent InMe you would think they could have chosen something a bit more considered than a naff blue picture of a lion underwater with some jellyfish.
Having spent a good ten minutes venting my frustration with this cover by listening to The Dillinger Escape Plan at standard ear melting volume, I decide it is time to give InMe the benefit of the doubt and pop said new record on. Thankfully opener “Reverie Shores” is a good deal better than the blue monstrosity. Since the days of “White Butterfly” InMe have regularly dabbled in progressive and technical metal, something which is immediately obvious here, with brief snatches of guitar wizardry and the odd handful of angular riffage. However don’t get the wrong impression. InMe have not become a wilfully obtuse metal act, nor have they dumped the sing-along chorus of old. “The Pride” is an album, first and foremost, of songs. That is what InMe do. It is what they initially made their name for. They may have had some unfortunate tendencies in the ‘let’s stick some weird sound effects over that in the hope that some people may mistake that for making it interesting’ department before but on this album they seem to have largely overcome that. Sure there are some painfully obvious attempts at ‘experimentation’ but they are not dominant and don’t interfere with the number one objective, great songs.
Sadly this collection of attempted ‘great songs’ is a hit and miss one not a triumphant one. The elegant mid-paced “Escape to Mysteriopa” (I think Dave McPherson may have been listening to Rush when he coined that title) has a flowing majesty whilst the likes of the previously mentioned opener and “Guardian” are up-tempo alt-metal delights and closer “Legacy” morphs into a true epic towards its conclusion. The likes of “Moonlit Seabed” and “Pantheon” though are utterly forgettable and the otherwise excellent “Beautiful Sky Gardens” features lyrics that trickle over from strange into ridiculous. Any song that makes a deadly serious attempt to includes lines like “I’m a T-Rex, I scare all my best friends away” sadly comes across as more laugh inducing than head bang worthy. At least the way it is sung gives it some credence. One has to admit that Dave McPherson’s voice, although still erm, unique, has improved greatly since the band’s early days. Stronger and more tuneful than ever, he is truly convincing here, as is the musicianship from the entire band.
Yet it is hard to determine whether being a technically better band than you used to be makes you a better band overall. “The Pride” has some great songs but it is hard to see InMe reaching out to a new generation of disenchanted teens and, aside from that crowd and the band’s die-hard loyal followers, it is hard to see who else would actually really enjoy listening to this record. It is not metal enough to satisfy fervent metalheads and it is not pop enough to appeal to the rest. Passable this album may be but is it going to keep InMe’s mini-resurgence going any longer than it already has? It’s honestly difficult to tell but there is another way I can frame my feelings about this album. Before I listened to it I honestly didn’t think there was any point in InMe existing anymore but this record has heart and, for all its faults, it is a damn good effort at being something that, in all probability, this band will never be. For that I am a glad InMe are alive and I am glad that InMe are still releasing records.
“The Pride” is out on Monday.
InMe launch a 35 date tour of the UK on the 22nd February – yes, you read that right, a 35 date tour of the UK. This is the sort of tour that bands rarely do any more and seeing as it is pretty hard to live anywhere in the country that is not near somewhere that they are playing you should probably make the effort to leave your house and go and see them, even if it’s just to congratulate them on putting such a hard shift in. Good on them.
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First impressions are important when buying a record. Now I am not suggesting that your average InMe is a vinyl connoisseur who sees the artwork as being one of the most important deciding factors in their purchase BUT the cover for this album is one of the worst things I have ever seen in my life. It looks like the sort of thing I’d expect a bunch of nine year old comic book fans to flock to and literally no one else. I mean for a record that could really make or break the resurgent InMe you would think they could have chosen something a bit more considered than a naff blue picture of a lion underwater with some jellyfish.
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