Not that long-time acolytes need start blubbering, mind you. God Dethroned remain resolute in their melodic death metal persuasion, only this time round they've managed to evolve the blueprint enough to ensure that when a track like "Under a Darkening Sky" gets its hooks into you, it sinks deep enough that you'd need surgery to have it removed. Accompanied by a major step forward in their songwriting is a more aggressive bent that on "Fallen Empires" subtly betrays a fondness for Bolt Thrower's galloping war anthems. Having written God Dethroned off as another in an endless queue of disposable European melodic death metal, capable of little more than putting me to sleep, I stand very happily corrected.