About two years ago I received the debut album of the German death metal band Commander, which was a promising disc. A nice balance between death and thrash metal with a brutal yet Swedish sounding production. Now its successor lies before me, entitled The Enemies We Create.

 

The band sounds a bit different than with its debut World’s Destructive Domain. The sound leans a bit more towards thrash, especially in the production you can hear this. I think this is a bit of a shame, because the previous record had a sort of Swedish death metal sound, which suited the band perfectly. The riffs they play aren’t too technical but more groove-aimed, which is something you hear in every song. Yet the production of this record doesn’t grab me as much as the previous one did.

 

Now I’m not saying this is a bad record, it’s just that the style they play has been done by so many bands before, if you don’t give it an awesome production that stands out from the masses it gets easily overlooked I fear. And this is a tight band that knows how to play, but in this form it doesn’t really add to the genre. A nice listen, but nothing remarkably shocking.