Sacred Warpath

Sacred Warpath is an EP that Steamhammer/SPV released in Germany on 28 November 2014, with the rest of Europe following on 1 December and North America on 20 January 2015. It holds four tracks, and the title song is the only new studio recording. Tom Angelripper explained that "Sacred Warpath" had been written for the next album and that the band chose to put it out early as a foretaste of the new material. The credits give its recording and production to Cornelius Rambadt and Sodom, with Rambadt also mixing and mastering it. The players are Tom Angelripper on bass and vocals, Bernemann on guitar and Markus "Makka" Freiwald on drums. The other three tracks are live versions of "The Saw Is the Law", "City of God" and "Stigmatized". Tom Angelripper said all three had been recorded in Germany that year and expected the record to become a collector's item; Arne Lakenmacher is credited with recording and mixing the live tracks. The cover is a design Tom Angelripper had drawn for a demo sleeve in the 1980s, repainted in oil by Christian Ermel, and he added that if it all sounded a little old-school, that was intended, because it was what Sodom had always been. The title song went on to appear two years later as the tenth track of the album Decision Day. The EP came out on CD, as a download and as a clear 10-inch vinyl limited to 1,000 copies, with the title song on one side and the three live tracks on the other. A production problem held the 10-inch back until 19 December in Germany and 22 December in the rest of Europe: the finished records carried a small error that came too late to correct on the first run, so the band turned it into a contest, inviting fans to find the mistake and send in their answers by 3 December. The EP did not enter the German chart.