Cracked Brain

Destruction were partway through recording their fourth album in 1989 when they parted company with bassist and singer Schmier. Guitarist Mike Sifringer has recalled that the drums and rhythm guitars were already on tape at Union Studios in Munich, an expensive room, but that Schmier was no longer happy with the material, so the session was abandoned and everyone went home. Sifringer has since admitted that they got it wrong and should have talked it through, and that the two did not meet for years afterwards. The band's own chronology of 2000 also places the split during the Cracked Brain sessions. The remaining three turned to André Grieder of the Swiss thrash band Poltergeist. Drummer Oliver Kaiser has said Grieder was an old friend whose melodic approach they liked, and that because nobody could replace Schmier they chose to take the vocals in another direction. To save money, bass and vocals were recorded at Sky Trak in Berlin, and by the time Grieder flew in, every part had already been worked out for him. The mix was done back in Munich by producer Guy Bidmead with Kaiser, guitarist Harry Wilkens and Sifringer. Sifringer and Wilkens shared guitar and bass, Christian Engler added bass, and Kaiser wrote the lyrics. The fifth track is "My Sharona", a song by The Knack; Sifringer says the idea was his and Kaiser's, and that Schmier hated it. "S.E.D." stands for "Socialists' Eternal Death" and takes aim at the ruling class of an East Germany that was coming apart. Andreas Marschall, who had painted the cover of Live Without Sense, painted this one too. Steamhammer (SPV) released the album in Germany on LP and CD in June 1990, and Noise issued it in Britain and the United States. The band's own discography goes straight from this record to All Hell Breaks Loose in 2000 and leaves out what came out under the name without Schmier in between. High Roller Records reissued it on LP in 2017.