ECHOES OF DEVASTATION, formally known as Kobold, are back in 2008 with their second album and present themselves better then ever before. The opener and title-track makes sure that this will be a nice ride. Typical death metal intro and then a punch in the face. Technical death metal with lots of groove. The sound also improved since the last record, so you can lean back and just enjoy. After My Cold Reign with its straight death metal and the groovy bridge comes Living Enes to show the other side of the coin. Especially in the beginning influences from bands like At The Gates and old In Flames can be clearly pointed out. That’s true for the next song too, spiced with fast and groovy parts. The intro to Hate reminds me of Welcome Home (Sanitarium) from Metallica but soon after that the guys come back to the typical mixture between Death and melodic Death Metal. In this song all the guys, especially vocalist Florian show all their skills and make it to the best song of this record. A fact that is strongly promoted by the good guitar works of Christian and Simon. With The Free Fall follows a very groovy song that comes close to some hardcore stuff, the weak point of the record. But ECHOES OF DEVASTATION recover and with A Rising Mind and Castle Of Insanity the next two songs go back to the high level of the songs before. In Servants Of The Reign some Thrash elements are added and thus a brilliant live song is created. In the last song, In Times Of Depression, the guys once more come back to their melodic influences and finish the record adhering to the standards. In contrast to the 5 points I had to give to the previous one, this album gets 9 points. It is not perfect, but close to the top. Straight riffs, technical shit, groove and melodic stuff. All lovers of Gothenburg-, Stockholm- and Florida death metal should take a closer look on this one. Respect.