Andrew Danso

What’s the point in doing In Flames when In Flames can do themselves just fine? It’s the age-old copycat train of thought, but in Synasthasia’s case, they’ve had to start somewhere. A common theme spanning through bands starting up, is to perfect their craft on whatever’s inspired them to pick an instrument up in the first place. What comes next is usually what matters, when they finally find their feet on the second project.

“Style Collector” isn’t so much a collection of ideas, but the expression of one singular vision - that being a late sounding In Flames. To their credit, with whatever budget that’s been gathered, they’ve put together a decent sounding production, that does show off their talents reasonably well, considering the genre we’re bashing around in. There’s a few good riffs in here too, and the occasional vocal splattered on top, does help to give the tracks a decent hook when the choruses fire up. Then again, it’s nothing we’re writing home about; this exists inside of an exhausted genre because of its commercial appeal, which lifts much more from the pop charts than it does invent ideas of its own. A patronising, yet fitting ‘promising’, underlines this debut.

5/10 Powerplay issue #142