Destruction - Eternal Devastation (1986)^{Release ID: 3006}

Just as with the debut album, I find Destruction to be highly overrated. This album has only ok production, messy musicianship, and the vocals are at times terrible. The squeals that Marcel Schirmer comes out with throughout the album are cringeworthy to say the least. It's such a shame, because there are some decent riffs on here, but they are sporadic, and always surrounding by average ones.

I know Destruction have a lot of fans and I realise I’m in the minority, but I just don't like this all that much. If I compare it to other albums released in the same year such as Master of Puppets, Reign in Blood, Peace Sells, Darkness Descends etc. this just pales into insignificance.

After their debut album of blackened-ish thrash, Destruction took on a more intense and killer pure thrash metal sound in their second album Eternal Devastation. This is such powerful energy with some of the best of classic Teutonic thrash!

There's a lot of top-notch riffing in here! It's different from what I normally expect in classic thrash while staying firmly in that style. The riffing dominates with catchy strength without ever having to drag in improvisation. It's quite d*mn enjoyable! The memorable riffing is indeed what makes those songs quite brilliant. Though one or two songs might not reach total perfection while they're still great.

The opening "Curse the Gods" starts clean and quiet before becoming heavy and killer! The aggressive riffing and drumming can easily cause listeners to headbang and air-guitar to that thrashy tune. The riffing will stay in your head due to all of its catchy fun. If you ever wanna play some of those impressive mind-blowing riffs on guitar for your friends to hear...why not? "Confound Games" is another catchy classic, especially in the chorus and fast riffing that will attack together with the excellent drums and vocals. How much more insanity is there!?

"Life Without Sense" is another great song filled with their trademark energy fitting quite well for its mid-tempo pace. There's more intensity on the guitars than the drums, showing how bombastic they can be without going so fast. "United by Hatred" shreds through in the intro with some brief neoclassical sh*t, then the riffs will get you headbanging through another long-stand thrash anthem.

"Eternal Ban" also starts with some shredding. The song is shorter and quite catchy, though the goofy lyrics are basically a declaration for attention in the world. Oh this band would get the well-deserved attention after this album's release... The 4-minute instrumental "Upcoming Devastation" changes the tempo quite a bit, with some more guitar fury. The ending track "Confused Mind" is quite upbeat. It starts with a soft intro that would keep you on your seat for the last bit of destruction that finally arrives. The guitars have made a memorable impact enough to stay in your mind even after it all ends.

All in all, this album is filled with a neck-breaking thrashy riff-fest that can scare the sh*t out of the weak, and make the strong stronger. The heavier classic metalheads will be up to joining in this bad-a** fast offering of mass thrash destruction!

Favorites: "Curse the Gods", "Confound Games", "United by Hatred", "Confused Mind"

This German thrash three-piece released their debut, Infernal Overkill in '85, the same year as fellow countrymen Kreator's Endless Pain and Sodom's In the Sign of Evil EP. That album wasn't anything like as good as those. A year later Destruction released the follow-up, Eternal Devastation, the same year as Sodom's Obsessed by Cruelty and Kreator's Pleasure to Kill, losing out miserably to their cohorts once more.

I used to like this a bit more (probably when I had less to compare it to), but now it just sounds shabby to be honest. There's a few good riffs for sure, but the guitar tone sucks, the playing is far too loose for really great thrash and the vocals are shockingly poor. Schmier's normal gruff singing is OK, but what the hell are those dumb squeals every other line? Instead of a really well-honed machine like the very best thrashers, Destruction sound more like a bunch of enthusiastic amateurs.