In Flames was formed by Jesper Strömblad back in 1990. The band as it was at the time consisted of Jesper, Johan Larsson and Glenn Ljungström. A demo was recorded and soon after the band got a record deal and released “Lunar Strain” and it did not take long before the album was a classic in the fast growing Scandinavian death metal scene.
With a new line up consisting of Jesper, Johan & Glenn along with two new additions: Anders Fridén on vocals and Björn Gelotte on drums, In Flames signed a license deal with Nuclear Blast Records and soon started recording the follow up: “The Jester Race”.
“The Jester Race” quickly became a big hit all across Europe and Japan.
After the recording of “Whoracle” in 1997 Johan and Glenn decided to leave the band and Peter Iwers (bass) joined. Niclas Engelin (Gardenian, Engel) was temporarily in the band filling in on guitars. With a fresh line up the band set sails and headed out on tour. Short after a very successful European tour Niclas had to focus on his other projects, and Björn switched from drums to guitar and Daniel Svensson joined the band, and this is the In Flames as we know it today. With the completion of the line up “Colony” was recorded and released in 1999.
“Colony” took In Flames to a new level and the band sold out venues across Europe, USA and Japan and quickly became one of the biggest and most popular Melodic Death Metal acts around.
“Clayman” which was released in 2000 even topped its predecessor and the awards started pouring in and the band kept growing in popularity. In 2001 “The Tokyo Showdown”, In Flames first live album was released, and gave the public and insight to the band’s live competence.
Modern and more mature “Reroute To Remain” (2002) again confirmed the status of In Flames and marked another milestone in their career. Two years later and it was time to take In Flames to a new level. “Soundtrack To Your Escape” did just that and was the logical continuation after “Reroute To Remain”.
In Flames continued to tour the world and documented these escapades, which resulted in the release of the phenomenal DVD/CD package “Used And Abused – In Live We Trust” in 2005. With an incredibly successful world tour behind them, In Flames recorded the masterpiece “Come Clarity” which was released in March 2006. The song “Take This Life” from the album is featured on the “Guitar Hero III” game. A game which has been deemed the bestselling video game of all times.
In September 2007 In Flames entered IF STUDIOS, in Gothenburg, Sweden, to record A Sense Of Purpose. The album was Recorded and produced by the band together with Daniel Bergstrand (vocals) and Roberto Laghi (Bass, guitar & drums) and mixed by Toby Wright in LA (Metallica, Slayer, Ozzy Osbourne, Kiss, Motley Crue etc) and mastered by Stephen Marcussen at Marcussen mastering studios in LA. In April 2008 A Sense Of Purpose entered charts all over the world incl # 1 in Sweden and the band’s highest ever entry on the American Billboard top 200 with an amazing #28. In Canada In Flames achieved the very same thing with a #7 on the Canadian Billboard top 200. “A Sense Of Purpose” was at the time of release the 7th most sold album in the whole of Europe!
2008 was spent touring, starting with a main support slot to Megadeth in North America, followed by breaking the attendance record at the famous Swedish Gröna Lund with 15.500 people in the audience. NO other Swedish artist has ever had that many people at a single show there. Moving on to 18 European summer festivals, in front of a total of 300 000 people. After that the band finished what became In Flames biggest ever European headline tour at the time attended by over 60 000 people ending with 4 completely sold out Swedish shows attracting 13 000 people. 2008 ended in style with the most successful North American Headline tour to date for the band.
2009 started off with IN FLAMES performing live at the Swedish Grammi Awards, the most prestigious of all Swedish awards. The band also won a Grammi for best metal band.
Award #2 for 2009 – P3 Gold award (Swedish National radio) for best Rock/Metal Other awards won to reflect on the amazing 2008 and the greatness of IN FLAMES are:
Sweden
P4 Dist Award
P3 Rock – Album of the year
Swedish Metal Awards – Best Death metal Band
Swedish Metal Awards – Best Video (Alias)
Bandit Rock Awards - Best Swedish Band
Bandit Rock Awards - Best Swedish Album
Bandit Rock Awards - Best Swedish Live Band
UK
Metal Hammer Awards - Golden God Award - Best International Act.
Russia
Russian Ramp Award – Best International Band
2009 continued where 2008 left off, with heavy touring: South America, Australia, Japan, Eastern Europe.
On May 21st 2009 “Disconnected” was released on Guitar Hero World Tour as a downloadable track. This is the second In Flames track featured on Guitar Hero. In Flames have previously been featured on Guitar Hero III – Legends Of Rock
The summer of 2009 saw In Flames conquer some of the biggest European festivals leading right into the third Canada/USA tour on this album (2nd Headline tour).
2009 ended in style with the hugely successful Rockstar Taste Of Chaos Tour, which the band headlined. In Sweden the band played their biggest ever headline gigs so far in their career. Over three shows more than 19 000 people attended and established In Flames as one of the biggest bands in Sweden, all categories.
In the beginning of 2010 the band took some well-deserved time off. Only three shows played over the summer. One of them was Metal Town in Gothenburg where over 25 000 people saw one of the biggest productions in the band’s career. It was well liked. In fact when all 50 000 feet jumped the pier on which the festival is set was set in motion and in its turn it set off the “earthquake alarm” to the nearby bridge because it was moving too much. Now THAT’S a crowd!
In September 2010 In Flames once again entered their own IF Studios together with Roberto Laghi, Daniel Bergstrand and Örjan Örnkloo to start the recording of the new album. The album “Sounds Of A Playground Fading” is planned for release sometime in the first half of 2011.
Tours, shows and festivals for 2011 has already been booked and confirmed.
This is how the first half of 2011 looks like:
June 2010 3 – Rock Im Park – Germany
4 – Rock Am Ring – Germany
11 – Sonisphere Festival – Czech Republic
13 – Nova Rock festival – Austriav 17 – Hellfest – France
19 – Sonisphere Festival – Turkey
24 – Sonisphere Festival – Switzerland
July 2 – Sonisphere Festival – Finland
7 – Norway Rock Festival – Finland
9 – Sonisphere Festival – Sweden
10 – Sonisphere Festival – UK
July 12th – August 14th – Rockstar Mayhem Tour 2011
http://mayhemfest.com/
More shows are to be announced VERY soon.
For more info and news on what is happening in the world of IN FLAMES see websites below
inflames.com
jesterhead.com
facebook.com/inflames
twitter.com/InFlames_SWE
myspace.com/inflames
youtube.com/InFlamesGBG
vimeo.com/inflames
http://c.itunes.apple.com/us/profile/id-15252
www.ifstudios.se
In 2010 founding member Jesper Strömblad left the band. Jesper who before officially leaving the band took some time off touring and was at the time replaced live by Niclas Engeling (the same Niclas who was temporarily in the band back in 1997). Now it’s 2011 and Niclas has become a full member of In Flames.