EP review: Sodom “Bombenhagel”
German thrash metal legend Tom Angelripper and his Sodom are back with a fab new three-track EP.
Forty years since it was founded, German thrash metal band Sodom is as good as ever and still led from the front by Tom Angelripper. The “Bombenhagel” EP is everything we could have hoped for. The title track is a re-recording of an old classic Sodom song with the band’s current line-up. “Bombenhagel” originally appeared on Sodom’s 1987 album “Persecution Mania”. The original version contained a guest guitar solo by producer and studio engineer Harris Johns and, yes, he is back with another guitar solo for this great new version of the song. The other two songs on this EP, “Coup de Grace” and “Pestiferous Posse”, are brand new songs. “Coup de Grace” is my favourite track here because the way it kicks off with a runaway lead guitar, continues with heavy and hard-hitting thrash metal of the classic Sodom kind and finishes with an Angelripper scream. “Pestiferous Posse” is a splendid song that is also heavy-as-hell but it has some more tempo variations and slows down quite a bit in the middle. The current line-up of the band is the same as recorded last year’s full-length album “Genesis XIX”: Tom Angelripper on bass and vocals, Frank Blackfire and Yorck Segatz on guitars and Toni Merkel on drums. It is a very strong line-up, quite possibly the best-ever version of the band.
Sodom’s EP “Bombenhagel” will be released on 20th August via Steamhammer/SPV.
