Commander – The Enemies We Create
2008 marks another significant step in the history of COMMANDER, since this band, being one of the most important German Death Metal hopefuls, reports back in these days, both deafening and on fire, with their second album "The Enemies We Create".
Already around since 1999, this juggernaut keeps picking up steam. Still a nameless project called into being by singer and guitarist Nick Kolar and base-player Birgit Öllbrunner back then, it was tellingly named COMMANDER later on as it slowly developed, becoming a Death Metal band to be reckoned with at the front line of the German Death scene.
The first years were times of shaping the foundations. Apart from working on their first songs, COMMANDER made themselves a name by playing support shows for well-known acts such as Six Feet Under, Dew-Scented and Equilibrium and thus slowly turned into a firm, destructive unity.
In 2006, the eagerly awaited debut "World’s Destructive Domination" was released, which made an impact with both the press and the fans equally. Already back then the Munich-based band played rock hard Death Metal, fairly straight-forward and crushing everything in its way through its massive and nearly overwhelming appearance. It was not so much about re-inventing the wheel. It was rather about refining the pure essence of Death Metal – blaring riffs and bursting drums – by adding some finesse and thus forging it into a special experience. An enterprise COMMANDER definitely succeeded in. Apart from some mini-tours (with Dew-Scented, Fear My Thoughts, Equilibrium and others) through Germany, Austria and Switzerland, COMMANDER managed to gather a rapidly growing fan-base especially by playing at festivals such as the Walpurgis Metal Days, the Kielowatt Festival and the Dong Open Air as well as support shows for Obituary, Destruction and Behemoth.
Two years later – the first quake spread by "World’s Destructive Domination" has not really ceased yet –COMMANDER hit the ground running once again and serve an absolute Death Metal feast entitled "The Enemies We Create". Recorded at the Helion-Studios in Munich (Atargatis, Equilibrium, Sycronomica and others), the new disk represents the most mature and versatile side of COMMANDER up to date. The ones who thought the guys from Munich had already shot their bolts with their first album better have another think coming. Like its predecessor, "The Enemies We Create" is firmly rooted within the rugged and brute Death Metal, yet its thrashy experiments guarantee for the much-cited variety, something other releases within that segment often lack in, unfortunately. Thus, the Bavarian band doesn’t even move away from their base too far, which is riff-orientated Death. Rather, COMMANDER’s very effective breaks and explosive thrashy riff thunderstorms give songs like ’Vengeful Angel’ or ’New Age Of Treason I & II’ a certain drive which you just can’t shake out of your head that easily (in the truest sense of the meaning). On the other hand, sinister-halting riff monsters such as ’Still Alive’ or the title track, which particularly emphasises Nick Kolar’s multi-facetted singing, complete the picture providing the perfect atmosphere for the theme of this almost-concept album. "Contentwise, the "The Enemies We Create" is about creating and the existence of bogeymen and how we deal with them, something which has shown to be an absolutely fascinating and complex theme ", tells frontman Nick. "I mean, nowadays you keep catching yourself creating so-called bogeymen for yourself. Society declines more and more into a large, dumb lump thinking its sole meaning of existence is to compete with and to outdo self-created bogeymen. We have looked upon this theme from different perspectives and have written down our thoughts on that matter."This concept works out perfectly also musicwise, as "The Enemies We Create" definitely shows, since COMMANDER present themselves more mature and more complex than we had expected without losing an inch of their penetrating power.
Certainly, there has hardly been a more versatile and at the same time more uncontrolled way as with "The Enemies We Create" to screw your heads off these days.
Marcel Rudoletzky (Translated by Mark Pendry)
