Third album from the Berlin based band and again the five-piece stretches itself a little more in terms of sound and audible influences. In the mostly fast, but also technically adept style of their songs, they do have a number of tempo changes and clever breaks, which contributes a lot to the fact that their record is varied and exciting to listen to. More than before, DEHUMAN REIGN break out of the corset of dense, incredibly fast and intense played MORBID ANGEL and SUFFOCATION type of Death Metal and allow themselves a pleasant amount of Thrash Metal influences, while some guitar solos even do transport a touch of Chuck Schuldiner and DEATH like in ‘Let Chaos Reign’ or ‘Opium’. Speaking of Thrash, it seems like the guitarists fell in love with some Bay Area riffings and were listening to KREATOR stuff like “Terrible Certainty” and “Extreme Aggression”. I mean who doesn’t? So it’s a Death Metal album which does not lack the inherent brutality and fury of this genre and which allows itself the luxury of playing with other influences in songs like ‘Heretic’ or ‘The Ancient Enemy’, while other songs like ‘Cursed To Feed On Flesh’ or ‘An Envoy From The In Between’ do remain organic Death Metal, jumping right into the listeners face. Despite the growl vocals of singer Alex the emphasis of the lyrics is sometimes easy to understand. Another bonus point that crystalizes out over the whole length of the record and helps getting an idea of Alex’ thoughts behind songs like ‘Preparing Armageddon’. And the final track ‘Des Geistes Störung’ (disturbance of the mind) might just be exactly this: disturbing! Not letting the album end with a happy end. In the end, DEHUMAN REIGN present their most versatile and songwritingly developed album to date. Well done! One should look forward to catch them live somewhere. www.facebook.com/dehumanreign, www.facebook.com/fdarec