Mad Butcher

Tommy Sandmann had told the band during the Eternal Devastation sessions that he was leaving, and Oliver Kaiser took over the drums. At the same time guitarist Harry Wilkens, known locally for his playing in a band called Razor's Edge, came in, making Destruction a four-piece with two guitars for the first time. Mike Sifringer says they hoped a player who could handle technical, classically flavoured parts would make the music more interesting. Wilkens had already helped out on the previous tour with Kreator and was a friend of Kaiser's, and Schmier stresses that both newcomers came from the band's own region, which mattered for the chemistry. The EP was recorded at the end of 1986 at Karo Studio in Münster, with Kalle Trapp, formerly of the band Wonderland, as producer. The first songs Kaiser played with the band when trying out were "Mad Butcher" and "Reject Emotions". "Mad Butcher", already part of the live set, was recorded again with trade-off solos by Sifringer and Wilkens and a closing snatch of the Pink Panther theme that Wilkens had played for fun; Schmier says it was the label that wanted the remake. "The Damned" is a Plasmatics song, picked at Wilkens's suggestion. When the label then asked for more material to make a mini-album, Wilkens and Sifringer went back into the studio and put together "The Last Judgement" in very little time. Steamhammer released the EP in 1987 as a 12-inch mini-album, and VAP issued a 12-inch in Japan the same year. Its cover introduced the butcher painted by Sebastian Krüger, who went on to become the band's mascot. Sifringer credits the butcher idea to the band's manager of the day, and Schmier adds that Sifringer had written the song's lyrics in 1983, drawing on the story of Jack the Ripper. Sifringer also rejects the label of thrash ballad for "Reject Emotions", which only opens gently, and Kaiser looks back on that song as the template for the writing of the next album, Release from Agony.