Opinion of the Pirate Bay trial?

Question: Do Earache have an opinion on the Pirate Bay trial currently going on?
From: paulscholesmanutd@hotmail.com

Answer: Earache is an Indie metal label, and I should point out, we are not a member of IFPI or member of RIAA, so Earache has taken NO part in the file-sharing lawsuits.However, we certainly have a lot in common with the larger Major labels because we too make a living from promoting bands and selling their music.Simply put-It's not cool to steal our music, we prefer so-called fans buy it at our webstores, and support the artists directly.Prices are damn low so why not?

The Pirate Bay is the latest showdown trial that the music Industry has been looking for, its a bit-torrent tracker, like many others before it, Kazaa,Limewire, Soulseek, but TPB seemingly went out of their way to antagonise any copyright-holders who politely-yet legally- contacted them for removal of their search results from the system.Of all the P2P/Torrent trackers, they provoked the most reaction from the industry because their responses to takedown notices has been downright hostile.



One look at TPB's top audio torrents chart (see pic ) shows that many of the major bands of the world have their whole discography available through the site,and also many of the Earache bands have their entire output available for free download- Carcass, Morbid Angel have 2 decades of work available on one click.The copyright-holder in me is annoyed, but the geek in me is gobsmacked at the ease of use, and the possibilities that it brings.

Just because its technically possible doesnt mean its legal.The problem is the young tech guys attitude to copyright.They cant stand it that someone else, labels, film studios, have a say in this, and seemingly gatecrash their wonderful plans.



We have dealt with tons of these tech guys,and its fair to say, we dont get on.They act like they are masters of the fkn universe, cos they have adapted some code that distributes files efficiently, and rent a server farm somewhere.The only thing they lack is the files to distribute- and that's where us content providers/copyright holders come into the picture.Its fair to say, we don't share the same world-view, we're not teenage hobbyists coding for fun, we would'nt mind the label and the artists getting paid for their music files actually.

One look at The Pirate Bay today confirms its covered in adverts for Poker sites and Dating sites, these are legit sites paying real dollar for the attention of the users.TPB simply have to share the ad revenue with the owners of the files to be legit, but that's seemingly beneath them.From their side, TPB cite their similarity to Google.com, they claim they are simply a torrent search-engine, which serves up the user search results, not the actual files.In many ways the TPB trial is a dress rehearsal for the big one- Record Industry Vs Google, Inc.

Fellow Swedes Spotify.com are using underlying bit-torrent software to distribute music, but they are clever and embraced the Industry.They have a snazzy interface/player and have struck deals with the major labels (and earache) to distribute the songs legally and paid for by occasional advertisments, maybe even a stake in the company itself.Though I imagine over time its the user data itself which has probably the highest value to future data-mining companies.

Too lazy to go out to gigs? Naaaaah!

Question: Hey Dig, simples question: which gigs do you go out to see nowadays? I know you watch your own earache bands, but what are 5 or 6 bands that will make you leave home and watch a gig? I would say probably old bands like Discharge and Celtic Frost with their recent reunions got your attention?

Would you see something like the Stupids and Extreme Noise Terror nowadays?

In my experience, the older you get, the lazier you are to go to a gig! ANY gig! From:

Answer: You score a bullseye with Discharge and Celtic Frost- yup, I was there for those bands' last Nottingham gigs. It might sound strange, but I don't really need any persuading to go see a gig, I'm still totally chuffed to see bands live, it sure beats watching mindless soaps on TV or a crappy movie, err unless there's a top of the table Premier League clash on Sky, of course.

Most of the time, like you say, I'm in the crowd when our signed Earache bands have a gig in Nottingham or London, many of the Earache staffers do go out to support the bands we work with, there can be 3-4-5 of us attending, we're a special case I guess because we all make our living from selling music and promoting the bands, Ali Marr at Earache goes further- he promotes his own shows for local bands to play (see flyer pic). Going to gigs somehow does'nt feel like 'work' to me.

I still get the biggest buzz from seeing new, unknown bands, the main venues that smaller bands play round here are The Old Angel and the newly revamped Seven.Rock City tends to have larger acts who I've seen many times, though their weekend club nights are immense.Birmingham metal bookers Re-animator have some of the best line-ups.

To me, theres nothing better than checking out an all day festival of new bands, ideally a mixture -Metal/Punk/HC/Thrash/Death metal or deathcore- theres bound to be a surprise or two in store. I crave new discoveries, I'm the dude standing at the bar watching new bands play, mostly in front of their mates and a gaggle of fans, usually they have no clue who the stranger lurking in the corner is, watching the proceedings. Plus at larger gigs I'll always check out the openers, in case they turn out to be amazing.I do avoid all "Battle of the Bands" events though- they are so artificial.

In the heart of the music biz in London many of the high-profile agents/managers/ labels in the metal scene attend private afternoon showcases -these are special shows in rented rooms,which are'nt in any gig listings and are by invitation only.Its a bit artificial, but these are popular because many people working in the biz in London have a long commute, and do actually prefer to go home in the evening.Earache however, much prefers to see new bands outside of London and in a normal pub/club setting with the public, I feel it gives us a better perspective of a band when they are away from the capital.

Last 5 gigs for me were Ignominious Incarceration @ Nottingham Old Angel Pub, Metallica @ Ice Arena, Nottingham, Gama Bomb/Cauldron London Old Blue Last Pub, Cannibal Corpse/Bodom @ Nottingham Rock city, in the last couple of weeks or so.

Send More Paramedics on Thrashing LAM Comp?

Question: Do you think that Send More Paramedics could have been as big as the new wave of thrash bands coming through now if they had started a few years later? I\'m guessing you were fans of them as you put them on your Thrashing like a maniac comp, and they were at least as good as any of the newer thrash bands you care to mention. From: redear16@hotmail.com


Answer: I know what you mean, Send More Paramedics were at least 2 years ahead of everyone else, singing about Zombies,and playing punky HC-influenced "thrash".The band were so far ahead of the curve, that by January 2008 when we released our Thrashing Like A Maniac comp, which showcased most of the new school thrash bands,SMP had actually split up for good, and diappeared from the scene. A bit like Deadfall aswell I suppose.

The band were actually the very first band signed up for the comp, aside from the Earache acts, because they were locally based to us, in the Nottingham area.Also the band were included as a favour to their label In At The Deep End, which is a local Nottingham label we take a great deal of interest in.As far as I know members of the band had lucrative jobs and so gave up the rock n roll dream for steady 'normal' employment, which is fair enough.

It's debatable wether the band would be huge in the current climate though, they were great, especially onstage in all the zombie gear, but the songs were actually quite punky and the bands getting huge nowadays are the very metallised thrash bands with guitar solos aplenty, as opposed to the more HC-influenced thrash crews.

What happened to Janus Stark?

Question: Do you think as a band janus stark were always going to fail? simply because of the involvement in the prodigy of gizz, also from what ive read in interviews with both parties the wildhearts were trying to recruit him at that point as well, so was it outside factors that effectivly killed the band? From:


Answer: In a word- yes.The weight of expectation on Janus Stark was too much, because of his Prodigy connections, the pressure for success on the band, especially in America, where they were licensed to a Major (Trauma/MCA), was much higher than any normal band, and they failed to live up to the hype.

Gizz Butt is a legend in the UK punk & metal scenes, but in the history of the Earache label, Janus Stark barely warrant a footnote, their fame was short-lived and time has not been kind to them over the years.We sell no records, and they only have questions on this blog,I guess by people retrospectively taking an interest in Gizz's Prodigy connection,or getting into his excellent new band The More I See and working backwards, which is fair enough.

In 1997 or so, Earache signed UK punk stalwarts English Dogs, the original punk band were big news in the 80's, first as a brickwall Hardcore punk act then later as a more metallised speed metal band which put out a classic album on Under One Flag/Music For Nations, the UK label which had released Metallica and Anthrax earlier in the decade.

By late 90's English Dogs had mutated once again, now a power trio, and led by Gizz,they were by this point playing extremely catchy hard edged pop-punk, a demo tape caught our attention so we signed the band. Almost as the ink was drying on the contract, Gizz informed us of a phone call he'd received out of the blue from Liam Howlett, who offered him the job as live on-stage guitarist for The Prodigy, I think his first gig was headlining Glastonbury Festival within a few weeks.

Events moved at lightning pace, because we signed the band as an fairly smallish punk band, yet within weeks their leader was onstage with the biggest band in the world, as the Prodigy were selling millions of copies of 'Fat of the Land' album at the time.
No one had any complaints, we all agreed we'd sit it out and record the album later, by sheer chance it semmed a foolproof way to promote the new band we'd signed.
We registered the name of the band, but to our surprise the word "English" cannot be registered unless you are given royal seal of approval, so the band quickly changed their name to Janus Stark - it was also to give them a break from the past, and a stab at a fresh fanbase since thousands of Prodigy fans were getting the buzz about Gizz.

Also catching the buzz was LA label Trauma Records which had had huge success putting out No Doubt and Bush.Trauma was bankrolled by MCA, which meant a very lucrative deal was able to be struck. Trauma's promotion of the band in USA took the driving seat, eclipsing what was happening in the UK- the major scored the band an alternative radio hit in USA and their music was featured heavily in a movie stateside too-in Varsity Blues they shared the soundtrack with heavyweights like AC/DC, Green Day, Van Halen and Offspring.The band gained a level of fame in USA but were unable to seal it with a tour because of Gizz's commitments to the Prodigy, who were busy touring the world's stadiums.

Ultimately when the band did undertake a US tour with Trauma label-mates The Flys, the moment had passed and even though it was a successful tour, it did'nt propell the band into the major leagues, leaving the label disappointed at the poor eventual CD sales.

Trauma suffered legal complications of their own due to Gwen Stefani's solo career taking off, meaning Janus Stark fell off their radar. Trauma declined to pick up the option and at that point Earache's interest faded too.Janus Stark split soon after.

Why Sell The Morbid Angel Master tapes?

Question: It says on Wikipedia that Earache sold the rights to Morbid Angel Blessed Are The Sick Master Tapes on ebay.Don't you now think this is a little bit foolish?
From : mikeholloway435@hotmail.com

Answer: Earache was launching its ebay store and we wanted to create some excitement on the interweb about it. We decided to auction something truly exceptional to catch the attention of folks and create traffic.If folks found their way onto the store to check it out, we figured they might also buy some of the 600 more mundane T-shirts & Cds which are on offer.

Phil who runs the ebay store asked me about selling original test pressings of early Earache releases, but they would have had to come out of my own collection,and as I did'nt want to part with my precious White labels, that was a non starter- so after a bit of thought we came up with something much better.

I remembered some years before that the Beastie Boy-owned Grand Royal label had gone bankrupt and offered itself for sale, including many of its master recordings, which were put up for auction to the public.It seemed quite an ignominious end to what was easily the hippest label of the 90's alternative rock scene.Bankruptcy auctions usually take place behind closed doors, but this was the first do be done online and in full public view, it created a massive stir.A group of fans won the auction and subsequently relaunched the label as G2 Records minus many of the famous names of course.

Earache was not in bankruptcy, neither were Morbid Angel, but technology marches on relentlessly, and in the Earache store-room today are hundreds of vintage "master" SONY PCM 1630 tapes which are quite unplayable, because they are 20+ years old technology, the format is obsolete and the machines to play them are scarce or no longer exist.They gather dust and take up valuable space, each tape is the size of say, half a lap-top, they are frankly bulky and useless.The data on them has long been transferred to CD (which is identical) and other modern formats.NOTE they are not the same as the original multi-track tapes -2 inch analogue Ampex- with each of the original instruments recorded takes- those were not for sale.

Instead of dumping the PCM 1630's we thought maybe they might have some appeal to the crazy collectors out there, they do have a historical antique value after all, as it is the actual tape that the first replication of Blessed Are The Sick Cds came from, with hand written notes and even a song title change written by hand, by me.It might make someone's day.

An Australian fan won the auction, I think he paid $700, and he was ecstatic to own a genuine slice of early Morbid Angel memorabilia, and we were glad to provide it.Naturally, he has no rights in the recording or right to reproduce and copy the tape, this is understood by all parties, except the dimwits at the online news services who assumed wrongly that it was a going -out-of-business fire-sale for the label.To be fair, most highly publicised master tapes auctions are for that reason, like sayTVT records recently, its an easy mistake to make.

In hindsight, if I'd known all the fuss and mis-interpretation it would cause, for a measly 700 bucks, I would'nt have bothered. But our webstore has done great business because of the publicity so its not all bad.

The D in D-Beat stands for Discharge!

Question: you said on a previous blog you see a d beat revival being a big thing what bands do you see doing it? Personally i see tradgedy, drop dead and disfear leading the charge with the newer bands following. I dont know what your opinion on this is From:


Answer: This is a subject dear to me - back in the day I was at many early Discharge gigs including at Derby Ajanta club, where the Decontrol single cover picture was photographed, I'm on that cover in the crowd gawping up at Cal the singer.
Discharge were beyond awesome in the early days, their importance to the punk and metal scene cannot be overstated.Many bands can lay claim to being influential but Discharge were truly monumental, they changed the DNA of the entire punk and metal movements. That's some feat, believe me, maybe only Nirvana have managed it since.

Its scandalous that music history books do not devote entire chapters to the Discharge scene,as the movement they spearheaded continues to this day.If the Earache label story ever gets told in a published book (Albert Mudrian's excellent book Choosing Death covered most of it, now other writers contact me regularly for the full story) you can bet the first chapter will be all about Discharge.

As for the new bands- Discharge have Rainy on bass again, in my eyes he's the star of the show, his basslines are so fluid, he gives the band that all-important drive and momentum.It took me 12 seconds listening to the new 2008 album Disensitise to hear Rainy's trademark bass rumble, at which point I knew they were back on top notch form. The countless Discharge-clone bands never sussed this,except maybe the superb Disfear who are arguably the biggest Dis-band in the world, containing members of major metal acts like Entombed and At The Gates, but Disfear get a bit too rock n roll-y for my liking. Tragedy are killer aswell they perfected that wall of power for sure, but my vote as the best of all the pretenders goes to Aussies Pisschrist.


Pisschrist


Tragedy - Deaf & Disbelieving live


Discharge Possibility of life's Destruction CD

Resistant Culture-LA's Crust-Punk band

Question: What\'s the story on Resistant Culture (Los Angeles). Why are they so mysterious in the metal/grindcore scene? Native American vocalist, female guitarist, former member of Napalm Death, current member of Terrorizer??? Why are they considered a \"well kept secret\"???... From: benaxiom@yahoo.com


Answer: This is my first time checking out Resistant Culture actually, and it seems a pretty cool crusty-punk band. The only mystery is why d'ya pretend you're not actually in the group dude? Anyways, It was a shock to see Jesse Pintado (RIP) in your video, now I understand why you mentioned the Napalm Death and Terrorizer connection.It must have been one of the last video recordings of Jesse before his untimely and tragic death.Rest in Peace, bro.

Back to the band-I think I know why you are off the radar of most metal/grind kids- your message may be very strong and heartfelt but your riffs don't seem 'metallised' enough or the vocal delivery vicious enough, maybe? The native North American chanting has more passion in it then the entire rest of the vocals which seem deadpan in comparison.Wheres the anger gone? I know The LA grind sound which Nausea/ Terrorizer popularised back in the day was deliberately mid-paced to accentuate the power, but even when you go 'fast' your songs sound fairly pedestrian -polite, even- when compared to say Pisschrist for instance, who are my fave crust-punk d-beat band currently.

I was impressed by your website which for a crusty band is incredibly slick, its design and usefulness is one of the best i've ever seen, I take it someone works in web-design for a living? And the flash game is pretty radical, its actually mindblowing and if some well-known major league metal band had released such a game it would be heralded as a major breathrough.So massive props to you for that.

Carcass remix of Bjork

Question: how did the carcass remix of bjork\'s track isobele come about? it seems a bit strange that it exists. From:

Answer: Bjork is absolutely brilliant.She's a bona-fide worldwide star specialising in quirky Pop, and you know what, she genuinely loves Death Metal- in her artful way I guess she considers it highly avant garde, outsider music, which it pretty much is.

Her path has crossed with Earache many times over the years, dating back to the 80's when her first band The Sugarcubes- an Icelandic alternative/post-punk band coming from the anarcho-punk scene- had a surprise UK hit on the fledgling One Little Indian label. Founded by Derek Birkett, the former bassist in UK anarcho-punk stalwarts Flux Of Pink Indians, the tiny OLI label worked out of the Portobello Road premises of record pressing plant Mayking Records. Every early Earache vinyl release was manufactured at that plant- thats why Mayking is etched into the vinyl- so I found myself visiting the plant on a weekly basis, its where his wife worked actually, but Derek himself took me under his wing, as Earache exploded in late 80's he became a sort of ad hoc advisor/mentor for Earache's business dealings, because he had the experience and knowledge of running a successful UK Indie label. Derek has also been Bjorks manager for most of her career.

Bjorks husband is noted NYC artist Matthew Barney who as part of the showing of his famous Cremaster Cycle part 3 performance piece formed an death metal ensemble including Hate Eternal's Derek Roddy on drums.

In recent years I recall watching Slipknots first UK show in London, turned around and there was Bjork in the crowd- she was loving the band's performance.Yes, Bjork is the real deal.

As for Carcass, the band were in their death-throes at the tail-end of the recording process of Swansong, an album they recorded for Columbia Records which was subsequently shelved by the major.Earache wasn't involved in those recording sessions but I guess Jeff Walker was cleverly reaching out to known Carcass supporters in the wider rock world as a means of making the band heard in more mainstream areas, it was a great attempt at self- promotion I reckon but it ultimately failed to save them from splitting up though. Carcass remixed both Bjork "Isobel" from the album Post and a Killing Joke song "Democracy" - the remixing process was basically layer the vocals onto left over riffs/songs from the sessions, the task itself was ably left to producer Colin Richardson to complete.

Bjork- Isobel (Carcass remix)


Killing Joke - Democracy (Carcass remix)

Is anything shocking anymore?

Question: Why do you think that now extreme metal bands can get away with more profanity than they could back in the day? The most famous cases in Britain are obviously the earache office raid over the john zorn incident and also the police arrest of ollie jones of desecration for their first record due to obsenity because their album featured lyrics about a pedophilic serial killer, other than the oceano incident its been relitivy quiet and do you think there is a way of a band overstepping the mark in regard to gore nowadays? From:

Answer: The early 90s was a different era- it was easier to be shocking because it was pre-internet and life seemed more innocent back then.The internet becoming mainstream in mid-late 90's meant masses of people could view whatever they liked (within reason) on the web.Sites like the trailblazing Ogrish which showed real-life accidents and gory disasters became easily viewable for the curious.As mass slaughter at breakfast time and televised beheadings became part of modern life, so it seems as though life itself has upped the ante on what gore-hounds deem "sick"- Ogrish was basically overthrown by liveleak.com.

The last band I know to suffer censorship was Scalplock who courted controversy by picturing Bin Laden on their CD sleeve, this was barely months after 9/11, and touched a raw nerve with the pressing plants and CD distributors.

Oceano caused controversy by accident when their bog standard stab at a Death metal type "Psycho butcher/girl" set of pics were removed from myspace within 24 hours and the band were threatened with account removal.
Myspaces act of banning the pics made them seem worse than they are, they sowed the seed into people's minds that the band must have done something really bad to deserve a ban, which perpetuates to this day.This episode was a wake up call, because it reminded us that the web space we all routinely use is actually owned by someone else, and they have regulations which we have to abide by, which I think is fair enough.

Bands nowadays have to go the extra mile if they want to shock anybody.Swedish band Syron Vanes have pushed all the PC-alarm buttons far into the red with their "Property of.." album cover.Blatant sexism on a modern-day record sleeve is actually quite shocking.Sophisticated it aint! But being retarded is half of its cheap appeal I think.



Earache itself does like pushing the envelope creatively, the edginess of flirting with taboos is what makes great art exciting, so we encourage our bands to walk that line,then wait and see what happens.One new release is stirring up a hornet's nest right now- Cauldron's album is not even out yet, but the cover for their debut "Chained to the Nite" has already run into trouble with the USA's biggest retailer chain Best Buy refusing to stock the record, forcing us to make a second sleeve available.

Carcass clones & Goregrind scene.

Question: Ive always wondered this being as earache put out the originals. What did you think of the carcass clone bands that have popped up over the years? and have you ever wanted to sign any of them? There were bands like general surgery who were friends with the band from their inception due to tape trading who seemed to work their music as a possible friendly rivalry and now theres obviously the bay area bands like impaled who mix the carcass sound with slightly more humour based lyrics. The end of the line is obviously The County Medical Examiners due to their actual day jobs and from what ive read the singer/guitar player would not be doing his day job if it wasnt for carcass as he was one of those people as mentioned in the 1992 interview on the necro dvd who took a certain root of education because of carcass! From:


Answer: Yeah its been quite amazing to watch the rise of Gore-grind as a genre.Obviously the genre started with Carcass' Reek album in 1987- Reek is heavily downtuned gore-themed speedy grindcore with sick inhuman vocals, topped off by a shoddy production job.I often cited it as my favourite album of all the early gamechangers Earache released, because this album had no links to the past at all,no anarcho-political lyrics, no discharge parts- everything about it was crushing and totally off the hook.It was a new sound, and for many years the record didnt sell many copies (it was banned from shops due to the cover art, and remains the bands poorest seller by a long chalk) but somehow, and to our amazement it caused an outpouring of similar sounding demo bands, they popped up everywhere- like a rash. Normally bands keep an eye on their progress via monitoring record sales, but Carcass had no sales numbers to speak of, so the band could only judge their success by number of their clones.

And there were tons of them- Finlands Xysma was the first Carcass clone out of the blocks, I beleive - I thought about signing them to Earache for a while actually, but never did anything about it, and anyway Xysma within a year or two sort of mutated to a heavy rock n roll act, and never returned to the goregrind. Just like Carcass.

The County Medical Examiners used to inundate us with their slickly packaged demo material, looking for a label, I recall they even had their Cd already recorded, complete with body part cover art, and just needed someone to release it.It was a nice trip down memory lane, and undoubtely they ARE the most faithful clone band to date, but we dounted their claims of authenticity in the medical practitioner field.Sounded like a yarn spun by med students to me- but even if it was true, how could they tour? Relapse did the deed that Earache declined to do.

Heres XYSMA in their grind days:

Dalek on Earache? Err Nah.

Question: Being as godflesh sampled gangstar, benji from dub war\'s obsession with public enemy and you\'ve said you were into music from the street have you ever considered signing any of the heavier underground hip hop acts to earache? for example the experimental hip hop group dalek sounds like someone rapping over scorn. From:

Answer: Nah. Too safe and boring for my tastes.

New thrash bands- will they end up progressing?

Question: Do you think there is a possibility in a few years time some of thease new wave of thrash bands could enter the alt rock arena like the original thrash bands did? admitidly metallica did it out of boredom and through rediscovering a love of sabbath( according to a kirk interview). I know it seems a bit premature to ask but i mean look at cave in then went from a slayer/death influenced sound to a radiohead meets foo fighters sound in the space of just a few years. From:

Answer: It's possible I suppose that this new crop will emulate their Big Four heroes and go more progressive and less thrash 2 or 3 albums down the line, but from where I'm standing, many of them definately appear to be thrashers for life. Most of the new wave of thrash bands are pretty young, mostly only being around a couple of years, and judging from dealing with our own bands, they simply play thrash because they love the genre, and like it or loathe it, you gotta admit its played from the heart.

Thankfully, I don't see any band "progressing" into alternative rock style anytime soon.The 80's Big Four Thrash innovators all "progressed" into markedly different styles, mostly slowing down, and thrash without speed simply stops being thrash, as everyone knows.

Evile do have a tendency to write the odd 6 minute epic- like We Who Are About To Die on their debut album, and their next album will I imagine again have a lengthy epic number (or 2), but having heard some demos, Evile are developing a seemingly more complex kind of Thrash.

Morbid Angel original painting of Blessed art

Hey! I don't have a question for you, but something to share with the readers of the Ask Earache blog, which I find to be very interesting. I'm a huge fan of Blessed Are the Sick, and on a recent European trip with my girlfriend, we had a fun opportunity. After some plans fell through in France, we decided to visit Brussels for the day, and being the bizarro metal fan that I am, something clicked in my brain and I did a little Internet research into something that I'd looked up years before. My lady isn't into metal, really, but supported my fandom by taking the picture I've attached, which is from the Brussels Fine Arts Museum.

Brought my copy of the LP all the way from Chicago just to make it full-circle. Enjoy!

Dave


Answer: Thanks Dave, this blew our minds in the office as we've never seen the original painting by Jean Delville It's way larger than we imagined. I think we received the art on transparency or suchlike from the museum at the time we made the album, so had no idea of the huge scale of the art.This is a great pic,I'm happy to share it with the blog readers, cheers for sending dude!

This got me thinking along similar lines, if anyone knows where HR Giger's Life Support sculpture is located, I would'nt mind seeing the original of that too, the sculpture was used for Carcass' Heartwork opus. Click pic to enlarge.

Insect Warfare- how come MOSH68?

Question: I couldn\'t help noticing that the new Insect Warfare disc has the catalogue number of MOSH068..and there\'s a blank space for that number in your catalogue..so what\'s the deal....? Why such an \'old\' catalogue number..? And, is there any intention to release another collectors/limited package in the near future (such as the 400th release)..? I was wondering if there might be scope for another \'Rareache\'-style item. Cheers! From:

Answer: Well spotted my eagle-eyed friend! We wondered if anyone would notice that this new release on Earache has a Mosh 68 Catalog number.The Mosh numbers have been allocated in sequence to each release on the label for the last 20 years,I personally know there's a lot of crazy fans who do collect the complete set of albums on Earache, so now and again we like to tweak things to make the collectors work harder, keep em on their toes. Earache is currently up to Mosh 380-something, yet Insect Warfare cites Mosh 68 on the sleeve, as you point out, which if you follow the label closely means it 'should' have been released in 1991 or so, not 2009.

Its always bugged me that the original Mosh 68 cat number remained unreleased, and our prime early catalog always had a big missing Mosh number in it.Back in the day, avid collectors used to speculate on what it might be,even. In 1991 or so Mosh 68 was due to be the SORE THROAT debut album "Unhindered By Talent" reissue- original label Meantime Records had gone bust and sold me all their tapes - but the record was shelved by me, because Sore Throat at the time specialised in being prime dickheads, Rich Walker still is one, in fact. They spent all their time and energies putting the boot into this label, and Napalm Death especially, dedicating entire albums to the cause like "Never Mind The Napalm".What started as in-joke banter from some fellow HC scenesters, soon turned a lot darker, as they became more motivated by pure jealousy at other's success. Rich even got headbutted for his troubles.It seems petty now, looking back, but when their ire and rhetoric turned solidly towards Earache, I lost interest in Sore Throat pretty damn quick, and shelved the re-issue.



For almost 20 years Earache did not release any grindcore bands, as none seemed up to the mark set by our early trailblazers, to my ears anyways.That was until we heard Texan grinders Insect Warfare who released their truly earth shattering World Extermination album on a small DIY label 625Thrash in 2007.This instantly became my fave grindcore album of recent years, I felt it was up there with Napalm Death's FETO and Terrorizer etc because unlike most other grindcore bands around, most of which captured the sound perfectly OK, only Insect Warfare managed to capture the all-important 'feeling' of the early grindcore scene aswell.

Earache made some moves to license the record from 625, but they had to check with the band themselves, who unknown to me, had split up after returning from a far east tour.So that seemed to be the end of that, we gave up on the idea.
A few months went by, then out of the blue, I heard from Beau the guitarist of Insect Warfare.From talking to Beau it was obvious he's a diehard fan of the Earache early output.On an early 7inch they went a bit ridiculous, and actually thank the Mosh numbers that influenced the band.It came up in email conversation that since the record sounds like the record Napalm Death SHOULD have made after FETO (instead of going all Death Metal) plus World Extermination could easily have been released on Earache in 1990, then why not give it an authentic Mosh flavour in the form of a spare early catalog number.The band loved the idea, hence Mosh 68 was finally released on March 2nd 2009.

KILL TO GAIN's demo on myspace

Question: after submitting many many demo\'s, im just wondering \"are they actually listening to them?\"
PLEASE GIVE US SOME FEED BACK.
thanks. From: bennybunter@hotmail.co.uk

Answer: Alright dude calm down...we get a zillion bands contacting us all the time to check them out- and we certainly checked out KILL TO GAIN.You submitted your details in the correct way - using our form on the contacts page of earache.com and sure enough your myspace page ended up in my inbox to look at, so you already did better than most bands- YOU ACTUALLY read the instructions! Congrats..Wow, its not difficult really.

Anyways- sorry to disappoint you lot but I don't think your band actually cuts it...the competition to be signed is ferocious, and you sadly are too unrehearsed/ too sloppy in fact.You are simply too new to your instruments, like most demo bands we hear.
Heres how it looked from my end, let me don my best Simon Cowell-type trousers -pulled chest high- and give ya a listen:

The Myspace player played me "Set Free" and within the first 15 seconds I could sense the drums were ponderous and the groove/rhythm of the band was not millisecond tight.In fact its way off,so we automatically pass.I didnt even wait till the vocals or main riff kick in before making up my mind.As it happens I think the sung vocalist was good, the shouty was boring- the 2 together is old fashioned.The song overall was mediocre.

The best bits of your band is the sung vocals, they sound quite heartfelt and mournful, about 2 minutes into "Because of You' is really cool-cos it is reminiscent of System of A Down or Scars on Broadway.You should ditch the shouty vokills because they seem forced and unnatural for the singer-his natural style is singing vocals, the beggining of "Used" is really fine actually- its your best song and should be first in the player and make sure it plays first each time.I know it unheavy but for some reason its your most natural style.

The shredding guitar solo type intro at the beginning of Dreamworld Massacre is frankly poor.And the uptempo shouty 'What did I Say' is your worst song in my opinion, there was nothing catchy about it.I'd remove that one.

So overall, your band is much like many others we hear- you are about as average as they come.You have some promising moments but its let down by overall untogetherness, and lack of tightness in the playing, and lack of direction.

In the rehearsal room or playing to a handful of fans these things can be over-come by the vibes and the energy coming off stage.When it comes to getting the opinion of the larger metal labels- the demo has to instantly grab our attention. Earache is no different to the rest of bigger metal labels, we are all looking for world class, original metal bands.Except in Earache's case we are historically more likely to take a punt on bands which have no fanbase but simply strike us as having a fresh new innovative metal sound-which these days is mostly the new breed of young Traditional Heavy Metal bands coming through at this present time.

Lastly I wish your band all the best, and who knows, if a couple of lucky breaks go your way, then KILL TO GAIN could be the big new breakthrough metal act in a year or two's time.Bands can progress very fast, I've noticed.At the end of the day the best advice I can give you is to tour more,and keep touring, as the bands that play the most shows invariably end up the biggest.

Godflesh & Pitchshifter - like Prodigy?

Question: With The Prodigy new album being number 1 in the charts, do you think the bands you had back in the day, like PitchShifter and Godflesh could have been as succesful as them,because Pitchshifter shared a member with Prodigy.
from gavinbeafourt@hotmail.com

Answer: Frankly speaking, the answer is no I don't think so, the bands Earache had simply were not talented enough to have the mass appeal of the Prodigy, plus they all came from different scenes.Prodigy and Pitch Shifter might sound superficially similar - the techno-ised rock beats and sneery punk vocals - but they were a world apart.The Prodigy came from the pure rave scene and were having UK chart hits from the get go, it was only later that the rock-ish elements came to the fore.Pitch Shifter were from the metal/industrialised rock scene, and they never had the skill to make the dancefloor beats suitable for mass appeal.Obviously it would have been amazing if our bands had broken through to chart stardom, Earache did encourage them to make the effort, and while both made an impression on the rock scene, none troubled the charts.Later when PSI signed to Geffen records they looked likely to make the breakthrough themselves, as Geffen did make the top 30 with them, but it wasn't to last.
Earache did actively sign some bands to try to fit squarely into that scene (The Prodigy, along with Slayer are my favourite band after all) we did albums by Generated X-ed and Adrenalin Junkies who sound pretty much like Prodigy clones, but neither caught on.
The Prodigy used a live guitarist Jim Davies on tracks like Firestarter - when he was ousted he joined Pitch Shifter.

Pitch Shifter- Genius


Godflesh Defiled

Generated X-ed Industrial is Dead

Lawnmower Deth and Bullet For My Valentine

Question: Which former Earache Records band supported BFMV in London last November? From: rukia.renji@hotmail.com


Answer: Earache's 90s madcap thrashers Lawnmower Deth reformed for a one-off show supporting BFMV at London's Alexandra Palace a few months ago.Reason is that the long standing tour manager of BFMV is the ex- LD guitarist and I guess he either bribed or dared them into it!The band were incredibly rusty and have barely played their instruments in a decade but pulled off an amazing set, full of crowd participation led by singer Pete Lee - this was always their trademark and strong point.We hear rumours of a summer show being lined up for them in a tent in a field next to the village of Donington, Notts.

Witness some of that ol' lawnmower "magic"- 3000 snails in London.

Incantation- DM hall of famers? Err nah.

Question: In the last issue of Decibel magazine, the one with Darkthrone on the cover, was a feature on Incantation\'s \"Onward To Golgotha\" album being put in their magazine\'s hall of fame. In it, it was mentioned they were turned down by many labels, Earache being one of them. I\'m wondering if you now regret this. I can see why you may not have signed them at first, their demos and early 7\"\'s are good, but not as good as what would come, as Onward to Golgotha came out to be a fan favorite, a classic, and a unique benchmark in death metal history; as would the band itself despite numerous line-up changes. From: marcusj33@verizon.net


Answer: Earache was fuckin snobby about music back then, still is in fact, I thought we had the best bands in the scene at the time, and Incantation didn't quite cut it, but this was a snap decision made at the time, probably on a quick listen to their first demo tape.

Looking back, its quite remarkable how we never signed a single one of the entire NYDM scene bands, I recall that I preferred DM bands with extreme drum speeds and nearly all our bands of the era had truly exceptional world class drummers, whereas most if not all of the North Eastern US area bands were ropey when they attempted higher speed, their natural pace was more mid-paced and gutteral.

The fledgling Relapse label did a fine job of picking up many of the North eastern area acts,as they were local to them. Incantation didnt properly hit their stride till 1992, which made them part of the chasing pack of latecomers by comparison to Earache & Roadrunners first wave of Death Metal acts, many of which were already charting and selling tons of records by that time.

Listening back to NYDM now, the drumming on Incantation still sounds ropey to my -admittedly shot-thru - ears, but I now really appreciate the gutteral vokills, in many ways they were trailblazing this style of vokill, and its probably the most recognisable trait that todays newer DM fans associate with the genre, thats why bands like Suffocation are winning the long overdue respect of masses of the younger fans I guess.

I answered a similar question a while back about another 90s North eastern DM band- Immolation.

heres Incantation- Golgotha:

Napalm Death's BBC 'Arena' documentary 1989

Question: In the 1989 napalm death live arena special is that you dig in the front row centre lighting up a fag just before they play you suffer? im wondering what was the show was for as lee mentions that its for the bbc before the band start the song? From:


Answer: Nah not me dude,my dreads were long gone by 1989,and I've never smoked. Y'know, I wish I could have been down the front of this gig, but sadly I was right at the very back, literally in the rafters of the Kilburn National Theatre (capacity 4,000) in London where this gig was filmed for the BBC's long running flagship arts series 'Arena'. I spent the entire gig stood next to the BBC's back cameraman and a gaggle of A-lister journalists because I had cite the name of each song during the set, so the tapes were properly labelled and reviews were correct. It was annoying at the time because this gig was the bands biggest crowd ever, it was a defining moment and was basically a culmination of the grindcore scene's unbeleivable explosion into the Uk public's consciousness.It went from Peel to NME to BBC in 12 unreal months.

The BBC is a remarkable broadcaster in that its funded by UK licence payers,which frees it up from purely commerical concerns- also part of its remit is to actively broadcast, promote and expose new UK music. Napalm Death were the hot new band at the time,plus thrash metal fans were unavoidable on the street - so what began as a documentary covering the Thrash scene became way more focused on Napalm Death, simply because the director of the documentary Helen Gallacher took a real shine to the youthful band. She was the reason that they got more screentime than say Black Sabbath. Remember also back then this was before Sky Tv, the hundreds of Digital channels didn't exist- the nation had a choice of just 4 channels to watch every night.The Arena show is highly influential, it legitmised the band as culturally relevant in the UK. The morning after it was broadcast,even taxi drivers knew what Napalm Death were all about.

Rock & metal music is nowadays massively under-represented on the BBC Television. After the passing of John Peel it seems the BBC has lost its only person who had the vision and openmindedness to embrace Rock/metal.They might cite Jools Holland on BBC 2 as covering rock, but Kaiser Chiefs are probably the heaviest thing on the show, and its not even barely rock/metal.

Forgive the rant, but the BBC TV's coverage of music is fixated on covering Glastonbury and the drum n bass/garage/dance scene, which to be fair are both massively important to the nation's culture and youth, but so is Metal. I'd argue that the metal/rock audiences for this summers Download, Sonicsphere, Hammerfest,Damnation and Bloodstock fests will even exceed the Glastonbury crowd, yet where is the BBC's TV coverage of new rock/metal acts!!? They should film Evile or Bring Me The Horizon right now.

Heres the highlights of the set which were rebroadcast as Thrashed To Death, the programme was hosted by 80s gothic vamp Elvira.

Danko Jones- Bad Taste?

Question: Does it suprise you when more mainstream acts namedrop earache bands as an influence? one of the more unusual i can think of danko jones of ultra trendy garage rockers danko jones frequently namedropping entombed(he took hellacopters on tour and mentioned entombed in the interviews to do with said tour), sleep( also high on fire- i know you never had them but inter related), fudge tunnel(and nailbomb). From:


Answer: Danko Jones? Never met the bloke but theres something fishy about the way his band's watered down rock n roll by numbers is fawned over by magazines as if they are rocks saviours.I can only assume his backers spend a small fortune on his promotion budgets.It's true to say, I'm not a fan,it sounds like garbage in my opinion. I notice his label is called Bad Taste,ha ha very apt.

As for him namedropping our old bands- that's cool I guess, though they have nothing in common with his insipid garage rock. The Hellacopters were a genuine rock n roll phenomenon in Sweden and across Europe when they came out in the mid 90's after Nicke left Entombed and it was pleasure to watch him make a major succces of his new band.It was quite a gamble because Entombed were very well established by then, charting in Swedish charts etc, but Hellacopters exceeded that by some degree.

Moby with Ultraviolence on tour.

Question: is it true Ultraviolence once toured with Moby? from: stevenranger@hotmail.com

Answer: Yes, that was in 1996 when MOBY personally requested Ultraviolence to support him on the UK stint of his tour in support of then current album "Animal Rights".It was a lucky break for Ultraviolence and a wonderful opportunity to play to more people.At the time we assumed it came about because there were lots of fans of Ultraviolence at Moby's UK label Mute Records, from the founder Daniel Miller to artist Mark Stewart, so we guessed Moby picked up on Ultraviolence that way.It was a nice surprise.
Moby himself had broken through in the early 90s rave scene and was well respected at that time- Moby's records would do modestly and maybe chart in the UK Indie charts but it would be a few more years yet before his massive breakthrough ambient-electronica album PLAY album hit the airwaves and TV adverts.That album camed out in 1999 and propelled Moby into megastardom and has sold 10 Milion copies to date.

Unfortunately this 1996 tour took place during Moby's short-lived rock period, he had recently released a basically Indie rock record called "Animal Rights" and the entire set was rock, not electronic at all.Moby fans were perplexed and the gig turn outs were much lower than expected. Ultraviolence went down ok-ish even tho the high bpm hardcore techno he played was a million miles away from what Moby fans had come along to hear.

Heres Moby in his rock phase:

Billy Corgan (Smashing Pumpkins)- Morbid Angel fan?

Question: You have said before about earache nearly signing nirvana, did you have any interest in any of the other grunge bands? The one i can think of with the closest link to earache is smashing pumpkins being as billy corgan was friends with the guys from morbid angel and always praised trey highly as one of his favriote guitar players in interviews. From:


Answer: This idea that Billy Corgan is a massive Morbid Angel fan crops up from time to time, and in my best mythbusters TV show fashion i have to say: "this one's busted dude".
As far as I can tell from Smashing Pumpkins wikipedia (which is far from the truth in many cases, judging from my own wiki entry!)- yes Billy does express his love for Heavy Metal and the heavier end of the spectrum at that, but I've never once heard of Morbid Angel being connected to this.
Plenty of big acts do love Morbid Angel though- Korn and Slipknot have been seen wearing the shirts, and we are aware of the long-persisting rumour that Korn recorded a cover of Morbid's God OF Emptiness song, but there's never been any official record of its existance.

How much money to record an album?

Question: Ive wondered when a band goes into the studio how does the label decide on how much studio time they are prepared to pay for? Is it a standard flat rate for all the bands or does it depend on which band it is eg a more seasoned band would get more studio time and a higher budget than someone recording their debut etc. From:


Answer: Having made over 450 albums I can assure you that the amount of money spent has no bearing on how an album goes down with fans, it certainly has no effect on sales.A standard typical budget to make an Indie metal album nowadays in the pro-tools/digital era would be £5000 but theres no hard or fast rule for this, though yes of course as bands get bigger their recording budgets expand aswell,mainly because they don't want to be rushed, but it sure does'nt mean the albums are any "better".

As an example, Napalm Death were on this label during the 90s and made their debut for £800 (Scum) rising by the time of their last Earache album to around £40,000 (Words from Exit Wound).Scum outsold Words album 10 to 1 and continues to do so. On a grander scale,the new Guns N Roses album cost a reported $10 Million to record yet the bands stellar debut Appetite cost a 'mere' $200,000, at the time, an extravagant amount for a debut.Which is the better album? I'll let you decide.
I firmly believe fans care more about the songs, the performance, and the feeling captured on the tape, than how much the studio bill was.

Nowadays recording equipment is basically software, its affordable to all, which means unsigned bands with home set ups can get similar sounding metal productions to the big guys, as the effects which shape the sounds of drums and even guitars can be literally added as plug ins to the software and 'dialed in'.Top producers like Andy Sneap are kind enough to share their knowledge, he offers tips and advice and even the exact modules he uses for sounds, on his website, and this digital recording revolution means most new metal bands we hear nowadays sound totally great.
The downside now is nearly every metal production is edited to perfection, and sounds incredibly similar, eerily so.It might be a different band name, but its the exact same crunch, exact same chug and exact same squeal.Increasingly, the personality, dynamics and hence the uniqueness of bands is getting lost.

By contrast rock and metal recordings made in the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90's right up to around 1995 or so, were all necessarily analogue recordings put onto two inch reels of tape, not the laptop.I don't think its an accident that most of the all time classic metal albums were recorded in the analogue era - as flaws couldnt be easily edited out- requiring a razor blade and sellotape- the personality of a band was indelibly 'baked in' to the recording.I'm not a rabid analogue evangelist, because that era had its downsides aswell- studios had to buy bulky tape machines, huge mixing desk, outboard gear, hardware,and so were hellishly expensive to rent on a daily basis.The few remaining studios from that era now seem like technological dinosaurs.

A producer is the most important factor of an album recording in my experience, as they can help get the ultimate performance of the song out of a band, and they have a useful role bringing another opinion on the process, apart from the musicians themselves.Record production is a pretty tedious process involving endless repetition of the song parts, so many of the best producers are skilled in the dark art and technique for ensuring the album is the best it can be- a classic trick is recording the 'warm up' take, as it so often comes out the best version.

I recall a producer - who recorded approx 15 of the Earache albums of the 90s and is nowadays an A-list producer- who used to have an amazing studio trick where if a bands playing was lacklustre, if they seemingly were struggling or going through the motions on a particular song- he'd get the band to try a final run through, but would flick the studio lights off as he hit the record button.The band would unexpectedly be forced to play the run-through in sheer darkness.This was genius as it concentrated the bands minds on the audio, which most of the time resulted in a great rendition of the song.

Earache on Spotify.com

Question: Why have you removed \"Cult of Luna\" from Spotify. Please put it back.

Regards,
/Anders From: anders.sundquist@bredband.net

Answer: Earache is a fully signed up label for the Spotify service, where music is legal and streamed for free on demand to fans, we are led to beleive the labels get paid through paid for adverts which surround the page where the music streams, I beleive.Earache has signed on,through MERLIN organisation which represents UK Indie labels like us, but the service has only just launched so we've not submitted our complete catalog yet, maybe 20 albums are in the system so far, which leaves 430 left to be "ingested" into their system.

Like most labels we get approached by maybe 2 new-fangled music player platforms, usually advert-driven, per week, they have the code set up, and now want to go legit and acquire content.There's quite a boom going on with new online streaming-music sites attempting to intice labels to join their party, now that Apple's iTunes Store is the number 1 retailer of music in America.

Last.fm is one which Earache has signed up to them aswell, and emusic.com. The massively popular Torrents and P2P sites for music could be rendered obsolete very soon if these new legal online streaming sites take off, if fans embrace them as a place to hear music for free, but the advertising revenue pays the label/musicians some income.Its a win-win situation for fans and bands/labels..Well thats the thinking anyway.

However an alarming proportion of the new sites are run by new tech guys who seemingly have zero understanding of how Record labels operate, and have no regard for what we bring to the table (ie the music).In fact they mostly expect labels to line up to donate their prized music catalogs to their 'cutting edge software' service,paying for the privilege even, while making highly dubious claims of remuneration along the way.Many of these sites are blatant attempts to generate online buzz in order for the founders to cash in and be bought out by Google or Microsoft for millions.The interests of the labels/bands music is secondary.These types of sites we avoid.

As you can tell we are sceptical of the frankly dishonest claims of many of the tech start ups, and we are highly selective about who we sign to for online content, preferring sites which are honest about how the label gets paid.

Looking ahead, all the big 'major' labels are actively teaming up with the worlds-leading tech firms to deliver the holy grail to fans, I reckon it will be less than 3 years before all the worlds music will be available to fans for free on literally all kinds of devices-everything from Internet ISP Routers/ web sites/ gadgets/mobile phones/games consoles/Satellite boxes etc, anything that has a screen to display the advertisements will be a 'All-The-World's Music' player device. Music will be ubiquitous and always on, for free, so long as you are connected by wi fi, mobile network or satellite.The music industry will transform itself into a payment model akin to a TV or radio style media network, where the content is free, if you can stomach the ad breaks every 15 minutes or so, which most people do currently.

heres a clip showing how easily Spotify works:

Earache & Industrial Strength in the 90s

Question: Hello there, was just wondering what happened to your short but sweet collaboration with Lenny Dee\'s Industrial Strength record label? Was it always meant to be a short-term thing? From:

Answer: Earache licensed Brooklyn native Lenny Dee's traiblazing label (but extremely underground/DIY at the time) Industrial Strength Records in 1995 for a 5 year deal.We released a double CD/Triple LP Hardcore techno compilation including DJ mixes and full CD albums by Delta 9 and DOA (Disciples of Annihilation) and Oliver Chesler's (later Horrorist) Temper Tantrum.The records, particularly the compilation caused quite a stir and sold really well for a year or two, but by the end of the term we didnt renew, as Earache was onto other things musically by then, as were ISR.Signing The Berzerker outright to Earache was our single remaining link to the ISR scene. The Berzerker had debuted on an early Aussie Newscastle area ISR vinyl 12inch, which I adored.

Looking back, five years was just long enough to piss off and alienate the majority of Earache's early diehard metal/grind/death fans who definately did'nt appreciate this label releasing any form of that dratted computer music, however "extreme" it sounded. Five years was also too short because by the time the ISR label was reborn in early 2002 or so, to much acclaim, and the scene rightfully bestowed belated props to Lenny himself as a true innovator and originator in the HC techno/gabba scene, Earaches involvement was by then a distant memory.

Not many folks remember that Roadrunner Records in Holland was at this time during mid-late 90's also involved in the Hardcore Techno scene, through a sublabel called MOKUM, this was big news in Holland, spawning many chart hits like Uk's Technohead, which achieved a worldwide number 1 hit with "I Wanna Be A Hippy", a bouncy upbeat hardcore pop techno classic. Roadrunner was owned for that period of time by huge selling Dutch-based techno distributor Arcade I believe, hence the connection.

Electronic grindcore is what it sounded like, heres the best of the lot, Nasenbluten's Classic CUNTFACE

Ephel Duath on Earache- how come?

Question: This is somthing ive wondered for a while how on earth did ephel duath end up on earache? the band seem to have more in comon with the mars volta or the jazz rock interludes of the old cantebury prog scene than any earache band or the mathcore scene they have been put in with. From:


Answer: Yeah I see your point, the band's current output is fairly alien to the typical sounds this label puts out -Thrash/Grind/Death/HM etc - but the band have been through quite a few radically different creative phases before the current album "Through My Dog's Eyes".A lot depends at what stage you picked up on the band, because they have been extremely chameleon like on each album so far.Mainman Davide Tiso is a free spirit who explores the outer limits of his creative expression through music, I think he enjoys that no boundaries are set by this label so he takes full advantage of the freedom.In many ways he loves keeping his fanbase perplexed and dumbfounded by taking them on complicated twists and turns.No 2 Ephel Duath albums are alike, stylistically, and we are just fine with that.
In the beginning 2001 or so, Ephel Duath was signed to an Earache subsiduary Elitist Records, and believe it or not was regarded as an Italian up n coming Black Metal band, albeit a highly avant-garde one.Their debut for Elitist Re-phormula (a reissue of their Code666 debut) contained proto-techno & drum n bass remixes which was unheard of at the time, and marked them out from the pack.
First album proper was The Painters Pallette where a jazz intrumentation began to take hold, Davide seeks out jazz-trained musicians for his band it seems and this album reflected that- its free jazz and screaming/hardcore mixed, and the band toured extensively, including as special guests on a high profile Dilinger Escape Plan jaunt, which is where the mathcore tag comes from.I would'nt say its wrong- it just summed the band up at that time, and has stuck.
Follow up Pain Necessary To Know is similar but more structured songs.Then he threw everyone a loop by recording a remix album of drum and bass, dub songs. Newest album "Through My Dogs Eyes" is different again, we liken it to Queens Of The Stone Age channeling the spirit of Frank Zappa, and its almost basic stonery rock, deliberately so. Its Ephel Duaths most commercial work to date, even though the subject matter is how life looks from the viewpoint of his dog! Barking or what?.This maverick approach is what everyone loves about Ephel Duath.Which direction Davide will take his band to next -who knows?- but fans can expect surprises.

Covering a Massacre song

Question: I wonder which authorship organization is minding the songs on Massacre\'s \"From Beyond\" album. The reason: one of my bands, Thanatos, will cover \"Dawn of Eternity\" on their forthcoming album. I\'ve cleared things with my local rights management organization, but I\'d like to double check that things went the way they\'re supposed to from the other angle. Since this is the first time I actuallly am dealing with cover songs, I need to make 110% sure that I\'m in the clear. From: Gerard@deitydownrecords.com


Answer: Great choice of cover!You don't normally need direct permission to cover a song but you came to the right place for info- its owned by my song publishing company EARACHE SONGS. You simply have to credit the writers as Rozz/Lee and acknowledge the song is a Massacre original, published by EARACHE SONGS/ MCPS on any paperwork you submit to the presing plant/record comnpany.
As for collecting money, if you have contacted and cleared things with the rights organisation (STEMRA?) then they will contact Earaches rights organisation (MCPS/PRS in UK) to ask you to pay. How much you pay depends where the record is printed-its typically 8.5 cents for a song, thats in USA rates (ASCAP) or UK rates are 8.5% of the dealer price of the album, divided by number of songs included.If you pressed a 1000 Cds - we'd get 85 bucks less their fee = $70 thereabouts- we'd get it in maybe 18 months after you paid it to Stemra- because those organisations are slow as hell. But thanks for checking.
I wish you luck with the THANATOS album.

Scorn and Geoff/Portishead's Invada records output

Question: Do you think scorn could have been more comercially viable as a band if instead of trying to sell them to metal kids you\'d possibly tried to intergrate them into the bristol trip hop and drum and bass scene that was blowing up at the time? Although the influence of earache on the scene has become clear later on just check out portishead\'s third album clear influence of justin broadrick and mick harris ( possibly down to peter theobalds now being an invada signed artist). From:


Answer:This question had me stumped and bemused at first matey..because its complete news to me that Earache type stuff could be an influence on Portishead's new output, it seemed like you got yer wires crossed, so I dug around online for info..and the connection is INVADA.

Invada is a label I'd not heard of before- but I recognise some of the output, Blood Island Raiders is a band we follow closely, and Gonga containing ex-Akercocke member Peter Theobalds, who we once signed, means we have a slight affiliation right there.So its a hell of a suprise - gobsmacking in fact -to read its the label of Portishead mainman Geoff Barrow. This is a bloke who is crossing a hell of a cultural divide, and deserves to be applauded for that.I mean its not every day that a Bristol trip legend from 90's Chart toppers Portishead starts his own label to release what is basically small unknown UK Stoner/heavy rock bands. I still cant quite beleive it.More power to him.

As for Scorn in the 90s, well it was hard to make their music commercially viable, it was very dark, very heavy ambient dub (as we called it back then) made by Birmingham based metal musicians held in high regard in the grind/death metal scene, but unknown outsode of that pretty insular scene.They were experimenting with sounds- heavy blood indeed, and the full impact of what those guys created is starting to be recognised a decade later.You have to remember that back then, we had zero in common with the Pop scene, could'nt stand it infact.The Bristol trip hop scene Massive attack, Tricky Portishead were pop stars basically - they were world's apart.
Scorn at the time, did have some odd mainstream flirtations though, via remixes on the Ellipsis album, Autechre, Coil and Andy Weatherall were involved, but that was about as far as it went.

Heavy Metal Killers CD & LP 13 best new HM bands

Question: Hi I have heard about the new Earache compilation for Heavy metal- how can i bet my band on it?

Answer: Listen for your self all 13 songs are here:

Fave old school Thrash band?

Question: More of a personal question than a label one but being as earache is responsible for a large amount of the new wave of thrash, which of the orignal big four is your favriote? From:


Answer: Thats simple: