Artist looking for metal design work!

Question: Hi guys, I have been trying to get into the metal industry as an illustrator for the past twenty years. I have tried everything, and spent a small fortune on postage sending examples to record companies. I work in all media including digital. Can you please give me any help (or a job!), sorry, force of habit!! If you can point me in the right direction, I would sincerely appreciate it. Many thanks. From: markjephcott1@btinternet.com

Answer: here ya go Mark..someone might see this and contact ya- hopefully not spammers tho oops!you have a website and a myspace page with galleries of your work i presume?i think you might be much better off approaching BANDS direct rather than labels- bands always need artwork- for websites, T-shirts, early demos and 7 inch records etc,its where all reknown artists have started. visit your local metal club and i guarantee there will be 10+ bands who are dying to get art..admittedly you have to supply it for free at the start, but eventually if your style catches on, you can begin to charge a fee.Good luck.

Cannibal and Desecration- how come not on Earache?

Question: two questions for you if thats ok
1)Alex webster said a few years ago that he considered moving cannibal corpse to another label such as earache, Was he serious when he said this or was it just a way of getting metal blade to invest more time, money and effort in CC. If the latter is the case how comon do bands use that ploy to get more label attention?
2)Have earache ever considered signing welsh death metal band desecration? its just im surprised that for all their years on the uk scene they havent got an offer from you guys yet, is it because they are a newport band and because of the so called scene politcs after what happened with dub war. From:

Answer: Earache has never had an official- or even unofficial- conversation with Cannibal Corpse about joining us. I guess our paths never crossed, and i imagine they are rightly happy with the work Metal Blade has done for them for what, a decade now, making them a leading death metal band, arguably THE biggest selling pure Death metal band of all time.If Alex said he considerd moving, i think, like you said, it was probably a ploy to get more attention from their label.maybe their contract was up and they were re-negotiating it at the time.We greatly admire their loyalty to the label that made them!More bands should do what CC have done.Tho of course of they did contact us we'd sign them in an instant!
As for Desecration-again, we have never had an official conversation with them.We are not madly into the band, actually, thats why no offer has been made.Its nothing to do with being from newport, and i'm not even aware of any scene politics between Earache and folks from newport.

December Wolves- what happened?

Question: What ever happened with December Wolves? \"Completely Dehumanized\" is one of my favorite extreme records ever, and \"Blasterpiece Theatre\" is just as good. Did they break up, or were they dropped? Also, how did the \"Porn Again Christian\" video come about? Did this video have anything to do with the signing of Society One? From: johnwalbridgeiv@yahoo.com

Answer: yeah what a brilliantly underrated band! their 2 records for Wicked World were pure, twisted, psycho US-black-metal chaos!!The band hardly ever played any shows and so kinda dropped of the radar..sales were sluggish, and they had line up problems too,so Dan at Wicked World chose not to continue with December Wolves.
The band didnt want a porno-type extreme video,even tho the song is called "Porn Again Christian"- they wanted something more traditional,more religion inspired, but we kinda talked them into it, as an extreme video on the web can get people talking about the band.I think we had just signed Matt Zanes mob- Society 1-and wanted to set him the task of directing an extreme porno video for an extreme metal band.He certainly delivered one of the wildest video clips ever made.Its certainly an OTT clip- 100% not suitable for the squeamish, or the underage!

EEMR PlayStation 2 game- how to get it!

Question: hello...i see you have a racing game comeing out in europe..... can you please tell me how i can get a copy of this game??????
thanks.
mark From: mr9mm@comcast.net

Answer: pre-order it from Foxy.co.uk coolshop.dk. or Amazon.co.uk

Heresy + Concrete Sox split LP ?

Question: I was wondering if you had any plans to re-release the Concrete Sox/Heresy split LP either in LP or CD format. I\'ve been on the hunt for this one for years, but have never been lucky in finding it. I\'m afraid that I already know the answer, but it doesn\'t hurt to ask. Please let me know when you have a chance. Also, I have been a big fan of your label for many years. I bought the Napalm Death-Scum LP when it came out so that was the first exposure to Earache. Since then I have purchased many titles on your label. Whenever it has the Earache label on it, I know its Loud, Raw, and Agressive, just the way I like it. Anyway thanks for your time and for many years of listening enjoyment. THANKS!!!!!!!!! From: mjb71@msn.com

Answer: Nah- there is no demand, as far as we can tell.Heresy split up in the mid 90's and Concrete Sox around then too...and you can get all the non-Earache Heresy tunes on an excellent LP and CD released by Boss tunage recently.The record you are talking about was Mosh 2 in the Earache catalog, and came in 2 different colour sleeve combinations, with the green and orange on the HERESY side the first pressing, of maybe 2000 copies.Later editions were orange and peach color combo.It was never released on CD.

Dig & Lars Metallica?

Question: Hey Dig i know asking you this is a long shot but anyway, Are you the \" kid journalist named dig\" that Lars from Metallica refered to in an issue of \"So What\" ( metallica\'s offical fanzine), When he was writing about the time he spent as a roadie for discharge, venom and diamond head during the early 80s, It just seems very coincidencial if it isnt you. From:

Answer: yeah thats me--I had no idea Lars even knew who i was...man thats a long time ago.. i used to go religiously to see Venom, Discharge and Metallica's early gigs in the UK (Marquee club, London anyone?. I had no idea lars was roadie for them.I havent got access to the so What fanzine you refer to, but if anyone has a scan i'd love to see it!

Earache Extreme Metal Racing PS2 Game-order it now!

Question: Will the Earache Extreme metal racing Video game on PlayStation 2 be available in Denmark?


Answer : its available for pre-order NOW from Amazon

Justin Broadrick to join NIN?

Question: I was reading a biography about nine inch nails and it said that trent
asked justin broadrick to join the band in the mid 90s, I know justin is one of
trents main musical influences however, was him joining NIN somthing that was taken
seriously or was it somthing that was just mentioned as i presume that if he was
taking it seriously justin would have disscused it with the label that he was signed
to. From:


Answer: I don't remember this one! For a while in the early-mid 90's Justin WAS in demand as a guitarist, and he was approached i think to join Faith No More and also Danzig's band, maybe even Prong at some stage.From what i remember, Justin always took these offers with a pinch of salt, because Godflesh was doing OK and was on the up at the time, and i think he had absolutely no intention of relocating to USA to join these much bigger bands, I think he much preferred to write and record his own songs and be in control of his own destiny.For the record, Earache never had much input into Justin's decisions, tho naturally we were pleased he kept Godflesh going rather than join up with other much bigger bands.

Since Godflesh's demise, I dunno what would happen if they asked him now.

Bolt Thrower- Realm OF Chaos

Question: Is it true that the reissue of Bolt Thrower\'s \"Realm of Chaos\" was done without the band\'s consent and permission, and the band will not receive any royalties from it? From:


Answer: Hey- if the band can keep recycling and flogging the same riffs for album after album , why can't we recycle our albums too? ha ha. See the earlier answer to this question here.
We have had minimal contact with bolt thrower for over a decade, since we dropped them from the roster in the mid-90's.However,we certainly did inform the band that the rights to the original artwork were due to expire and asked them for ideas for new artwork.However, the band did'nt want to co-operate in this discussion, preferring I suppose, for reasons only they know, for the record to be deleted or released in a plain white sleeve...errr neither idea exactly appealed to us.

The fact is, we dont actually have to seek their permission anyways....

Back in 1989 for Realm Of Chaos' original release Earache negotiated a special deal with the world famous Fantasy Wargaming company Games Workshop (who's HQ was handily based in our home town in Nottingham UK) to use their copyrighted artwork from a leading Game 'Warhammer 40K' on the bands album cover and all associated packaging- by about 2004 or so the rights expired and so the art had to be removed for new subsequent pressings.
Earache decided to approach the original artist John Sibbick to draw a similar themed peice of art, 15 years after he had done the original, but this time specifically for this album, which he was happy to do.

Its true the band were not happy with the new issue, and released a press release condeming it, which is in fact a breach of their agreement with Earache.Its quite untrue to say they will not receive royalties from the CD.They have received plenty of royalties from it since release and will continue to do so, i guess they have to stop condeming it first tho?

Getting Signed TO EARACHE (part 2,139)

Question: do u guys get back to the bands and let them know about there demo submissions regardless of wether u like them or not? From: Lagoratory@hotmail.com


Answer: nah- sadly not, we dont have the time to reply to the countless hopefuls who approach us about getting signed, but most CDs that arrive here or the myspace links you send to us DO get clicked and played.About 5-10 bands per day use our demo submission form ( found under contacts section of our site)
As an experiment we might offer that service to unsigned acts in the future, if bands wanna hear what we actually think about a demo supplied, we could offer a personal critique and offer ideas for improvement- I could be the Simon Cowell of metal A&R ha ha (minus the crap trousers)
.The most common failing as far as we are concerned is bands who just cant get a rhythm section to play together tightly yet, cos they are too new.Bands are just not world class within 1 month of picking up instruments- its frankly impossible.Our A&R ears are attuned to milisecond timing - if you are out of time even a fraction, we pass.
The second most common failing is lack of orginality.

However, labels notoriously get it wrong and miss out on perfectly great bands while early in their career, for various reasons- i personally passed on Dillinger Escape Plan, Fear factory and Sepultura as well as the entire genres of black metal and Gothic metal - so what the fuck do i know anyways?

Mosh 100

Question: How many copies of Mosh 100 were made? Also could you get the video or cds on their own in the past?

Thanks. From: s.mccormick74@ntlworld.com

Answer: Not many, about 2000 from memory, it was lavish release..Mosh 100 (hear it HERE) was meant to be a 'thank you' to the fans who had supported the label and made it reach the milestone of 100 releases in 1994.It was an embroidered DJ bag filled with a CD of mostly unreleased tracks and a VHS tape of many unseen video clips of the time, plus a free 7inch vinyl.It sold out right away.

Alex Newport - Nailbomb

Question: I dont know if you got this question the last time because my computer crashed when i was sending it but anyway

Is it true that the only reason why nailbomb could not sign to earache was because of max\'s contract with roadrunner? If this is the case how was it possible for alex to release a record on roadrunner i would think surely his earache contract would prevent him from doing this.
But the part that confuses me is that Matt from trivium is a member of an earache band how is that possible i thought being under contract from roadrunner would prevent this. From:


Answer: Earache has always had a great relationship with Roadrunner over contractual stuff like this, sharing some artists that wann make projects etc..over the years quite a few of our artists have recorded with RR artists on projects, Meathook Seed featured Mitch Harris from Napalm Death with Donald Tardy from Obituary and was released by Earache, in recent months our signed artist Cult Of Luna recorded an album for a project called Khoma for RR. But the best known was of course Nailbomb which featured Alex Newport from Fudge Tunnel with Max Cavalera from Sepultura.From memory, Alex got to become friends with Max after touring together,I think he eventually married the daughter of Max's wife, so they were even family.

As Sepultura were bigger (way bigger ) than Fudge Tunnel at the time, it made sense to come out on RR, as it was intended to boost FT's profile.

Nocturnus- Ahead of their time?

Question: Do you feel the reason why Nocturnus didnt do well when they were around is because they were too far ahead of their time? i mean bands like children on bodom and norther have succeded with a similer sound From:


Answer: Yeah i know what you mean- looking back, Nocturnus were quite a remarkable band, people loved em or hated them, for playing an intricate take on Florida death metal but with subtle use of keyboards and in Mike Davis they had, according to Trey Azagthoth, the very best technical lead guitarist in Florida at the time- that's quite some recommendation huh?To be honest the only thing they lacked was a decent rhythm section as drummer and vocalist Mike Browning was'nt that skilled at drumming( he was out of time a lot), and it was kinda off putting from a fans eye view to see the vocals coming from behind a massive drum kit on stage.Plus, at the time, Death metal fans were not opne minded to anything different or challenging, at the time heaviness and speed was all that mattered, and Nocturnus just did not trade on those factors.

All in all, Futuristic Sci fi metal is the term i'd use to describe their output in the early 90's and its true, newer bands like Children of Bodom are kinda vaguely similar in sound, but the ability of the players in COB is 10x more advanced than Nocturnus' abilities were.

Deicide- See Video for 'Homage For Satan'

Question: A while back on the site was news about the new Deicide video. Is it done yet and when can i see it online or on tv?
from Deifan666@hotmail.com

Answer: try pointing yer browser here. Its as Real Player, Quicktime and Windows Media formats.

Songs on Myspace.com?

Question: I heard rumour that if you post your songs on myspace.com, they now have the rights to it. Is this true? From: c.t.jones@hotmail.com

Answer: They have the rights to stream the music you upload i think, and then they lose that right when you delete the song.So it appears at first glance, pretty much fair and quite artists friendly.As Rupert Murdoch now owns Myspace.com, whose News International Group also owns many media/news/tv outlets across the globe, including the Sunday Times, The Sun, Fox News, SKY TV and many more, then i guess it comes down to wether you trust him with your music.

Earache & Sub Pop?

Question: I read in a book about the history of the sub pop label that during the early 90s earache negotiated a licensing agreement with them that failed to come off is this true and what bands were you after, i mean earth on earache would have been amazing From:

Answer: Nah it was'nt Earth- for some reason i never rated that band. Too boring and drone-y and one dimensional, listening to Earth is like listening to wallpaper or something.The band we wanted to licence was none other than --Nirvana, it was the only Sub Pop band I actually liked, the brilliant debut LP Bleach was constantly on my walkman because they had a certain intensity sadly lacking from the other more mellow Sub Pop acts.You gotta imagine, at the time, they were merely a promising up n coming Seattle alternative rock band on an up n coming US indie label.Earache was leading the way in the extreme metal scene in UK and Europe,and as far as i could tell, Nirvana fitted the bill as the next wave of extreme music,so we offered to license the next Nirvana album from Sub Pop, which would have been "Nevermind".But events got outta hand, and the major label "DGC/Geffen' bought the band out of its Sub Pop contract, Earache never had a chance to get involved at that stage, and the rest is history.
I got to hear the band very early on, and first hand, from Gary Held, the owner of Tupelo which was the tiny label in Uk which licensed "Bleach" from Sub Pop in the first place, and it was he( and the staff of Vital distribution) who was responsible for pretty much making Nirvana a big selling rock band in the UK.

Where IS Earache located?

Question: Where are you guys located? Are you in the USA or over seas. From: Lish2124@yahoo.com

Answer: We are located in mid-town Manhattan, NYC, USA- 38th Street midway between 5th and 6th Ave,above the "couture" shop to be exact see photo- and at Westminster Buildings photo in the city centre of Nottingham, England-which is actually where the label was founded, and acts as the main head office . A full list of contact adresses and email addys of the staff- can be found here.Our website acts for both offices but is hosted on servers in Miami,Florida and our webmaster is based near Derby, which is close by Nottingham, in England.

Heresy/Concrete Sox?

Question: trying to locate a copy of heresy/concrete sox split lp from way back .... any advice? available on cd? planning a re-release?
tar
steve From: stefgp@hotmail.com

Answer: The split LP from Heresy and Concrete Sox was only released on Vinyl by Earache. Mosh 2, it was Earache's first proper release it did all by itself in 1987 (Mosh 1 Accused was a co-release with Bristol's COR records).There has never been a CD of it, as it was not a favoured format at that time- Vinyl was still king then dude!You'll have to try ebay to get it nowadays...being our first 'proper' release it has an extra value to collectors.
Heresy had a later release on Cd called 'never slit thanks" licensed by Earache to toys factory in japan, around say 1992 or so. Sadly, Concrete Sox's side of the split LP has never been re-issued by Earache on anything because the band had split up by the 90's -and there is not much demand for them, 16 years later, as far as we can tell.

Adema "Planets" tracklisting Euro vs USA

Question: Hi, I´ve just bought Adema´s Planets and discovered that there are two songs missing on my european copy. Why is that?
Kind regards,
Thomas From: t.roth.chello.se

Answer: The UK/European version of Planets does indeed have less tracks than the USA version...the Metallica cover song is only included on the USA version as thats the only place we got a license to include it.The 'missing' songs are available in Europe on the b-side of the Tornado single however.

Missing mosh numbers in our Catalog?

Question: When looking at the \"catalog\" section of the Earache.com site, I noticed that there are several catalog numbers that are missing. I know that the second Sore Throat album waqs never released, but a lot of the \"missing\" catalog numbers corespond to some of the late 90\'s gabba releases. Why are these releases not even acknowledged anymore? From: johnwalbridgeiv@yahoo.com

Answer: Yeah- well spotted John.Out of the first 250 Mosh numbers in our catalog I see about 15 of them are missing. First of all, i'm constantly amazed that fans like yourself are actually asking about our back cat releases, some of which never saw the light of day, or if they did, are now over 10 years old, but still talked about.
The truth is theres a story to be told about most of the missing mosh numbers-about why they are missing. We pride ourselves on having a killer catalog of releases containing many of the most legendary titles in the extreme music scene, and the ease of numbering them as mosh numbers makes it easier for fans and collectors to follow the list.Those 15 missings titles do bug me, because they make the list incomplete.
As you say, Mosh 68 was meant to be re-issue of the first Sore Throat album "Unhindered By Talent", but i declined to release it, and the Mosh number slot stayed unfilled. Mosh 107 was supposed to be a meathook seed remix 12 inch, but i had second thoughts about releasing it. Some of the numbers were planned to be themed label compilations but we never got round to compiling them. The numbers 150, 164, 165 as you correctly point out were gabba titles we licensed from Industrial Strength records- the licences expired eventually, so were withdrawn from sale, and the catalog.(actually we could leave them as names on the catalog but we'd probably have folks try to order them, which will be confusing, so better to remove competely)