demon hunter began releasing teaser posts on january 30, 2014 related to "extremist", which was released on march 18, 2014. demon hunter released the album's first single, "artificial light", on their youtube account february 13, 2014, and also released websites to pre-order their new album. "the last one alive", and "i will fail you" were eventually released as promotional singles shortly after. "extremist" debuted at no. 16 on the "billboard" 200 selling approximately 18,000 copies in the first week of release. this is the band's highest chart debut, being 20 steps higher than their highly regarded previous effort, "true defiance" which debuted at no. 36.