40 Years at War - The Greatest Hell of Sodom

Sodom marked their 40th year with this album. Tom Angelripper's goal was to re-record one song from each of the band's earlier albums, choosing rarities and songs that had seldom or never been played live rather than the obvious ones. Angelripper on bass and vocals, Frank Blackfire and Yorck Segatz on guitars and Toni Merkel on drums kept the original keys, lyrics and arrangements. According to the credits, the album was recorded at Staudio-Studios in Altenessen, Essen, from the summer of 2021 to February 2022 and produced by the band, with Merkel engineering, mixing and mastering. The seventeen songs follow the order in which their albums appeared: "Sepulchral Voice" (the In the Sign of Evil EP), "After the Deluge" (Obsessed by Cruelty), "Electrocution" (Persecution Mania), "Baptism of Fire" (Agent Orange), "Better Off Dead" (the title song), "Body Parts" (Tapping the Vein), "Jabba the Hut" (Get What You Deserve), "Gathering of Minds" (Masquerade in Blood), "That's What an Unknown Killer Diarized" ('Til Death Do Us Unite), "Book Burning" (Code Red), "Genocide" (M-16), "City of God" (Sodom, 2006), "Ashes to Ashes" (The Final Sign of Evil), "In War and Pieces" (the title song), "S.O.D.O.M." (Epitome of Torture), "Caligula" (Decision Day) and "Euthanasia" (Genesis XIX, 2020). The former guitarist Uwe Christoffers wrote "After the Deluge" for the band in 1985. The cover painting is by Eliran Kantor. Steamhammer/SPV released the album on 28 October 2022 as a CD digipak with a poster, a gatefold double LP, a download and a stream. A limited box set, sold only in Europe, added a bonus CD with the new song "1982" and new recordings of three early songs, a cassette with a re-recorded "Equinox" as an extra track, and a 72-page book. The album entered the German album chart at number 6 on 4 November and stayed for two weeks. Marquee's Japanese edition followed on 23 November with "1982" as a bonus track.