Friday, January 30, 2009

Sore Throat & Filthy Christians re-issues?Nah..


Question: Any possibility of reissues of the likes of Sore Throat and Filthy Christians? I note both have albums in Terrorizer\'s essential European grind records but their Earache albums have been out of print for years... From:


Answer: I can't see us doing those titles again..both have been out of print for almost 2 decades, due to threadbare interest or demand.Sore Throat was never on CD at the time, but our friends at Disk Union in Tokyo sold a special 153 Track version of the CD (with unreleased rare first album Unhindered By Talent) about a year ago.Seeing those releases in Terrorizer's poll raised a few eyebrows round here, for sure.
A simple Top 20 doesn't really give the reader any sense of the massively dis-proportional impact that each of the albums had - I mean the difference between the historical importance of say Scum and Mean is so vast, its silly to even compare them.The difference in sales at the time, was equally vast too.

One thing that bugs me nowadays, is the online histories of all bands of the past now have to run through the distorting lens of wikipedia. Wikis are a great leveller of information,but in any music scene you care to mention, you can guarantee that one or two bands were incredible, and the rest were basically also-rans.Its rare that writers point this out.
A great example might be the Seattle Grunge scene from the early 90's, which congregated around the Sub Pop label.Its frankly annoying to read that Mudhoney were responsible for Grunge, as their 7inch predated Nirvana's by 6 months, which even if factually correct, fails to address that Mudhoney were a strictly second division band compared to the stellar trailblazing impact made by Nirvana. In a similar way, just seeing Tad in lists of the originators and prime-movers of Grunge scene irks me- they were a strictly third division outfit at best, and barely even deserve to get a mention in the same paragraph as Nirvana.

Japan Grinders SxOxB on Earache?


Question: So how close were earache to signing SOB before the incident with their singer occured? Is this part of the reason why none of the premier grind bands so often name dropped by lee dorrian( i seem to recall lee being heavily into grind/d beat band disclose) and shane embury never appeared on earache? From:


Answer: The UK grindcore scene owes a huge debt to the early 80s Uk Hardcore Punk scene which predated it, this fact is often overlooked by wikipedians, or perhaps because the connection is so obvious, it goes without saying.Either way, its worth emphasising- bands like Discharge, and the more extreme variants like Chaos UK and Disorder were half of the blueprint for the Earache-led wave of grindcore acts which followed.But the other vital ingredient in the Grind hybrid was the power of metal riffs and solos.Looking back, this ingredient was blatantly missing from those 80s HC bands, and is really the difference between the scenes.HC punk = HC punk. Metal = Metal, but HC punk + metal mixed and put thru the Mick Harris accelerator = Grindcore.

During the 80s Chaos UK in particular would tour Japan a lot,becoming absolute heroes there, and tons of HC punk bands formed in their wake, apeing the Chaos UK style, and a few took things even further and made it more chaotic, more extreme, Swankys, Gauze etc. SOB wasn't grindcore, just super speedy HC punk band, but when I copied the first EP for the Napalm Death guys it became an instant fave.Lee Dorrian in particular was in awe of the band and became firm friends with them, his fledgling Rise Above label was a hobby, so he could put out a SOB/Napalm Split 7inch for fun.Whereas, even in the early stages Earache had much more serious concerns and ambition, I wanted the labels output to break with the HC punk tradition, plus I was dedicated to building solid careers for the bands I signed. Actually it took the Earache musicians themselves a few years to get this fact about the label- many of them quit-including Lee himself, because a long term career playing grindcore seemed absolutely unthinkable in 1987-1988 or so.
I loved SOB's music, but lack of finances forced me to spend a long time considering pros and cons of every act to be signed. Questions like: how could a Japanese band tour Europe? how could it be financed? Those kinda questions were a major consideration for me.Hence I never approached SOB about a deal.

Heres SOB when they were HC

Thursday, January 29, 2009

Earache's Early US bands- Accused etc?


Question: The stories of how Earache hooked up with its early European acts is well chronicled, but how did the label connect with some of the early American acts like The Accused, Spazztic Blurr, and O.L.D.? These bands obviously weren\'t playing shows at the Mermaid, so I am curious to know how they were discovered. From: johnwalbridgeiv@yahoo.com


Answer: Simple explanation is- by being a hub of the thriving tape trading circuit, which during the 80s was the way of passing good music around among friends,via post.I recall sitting in my apartment churning out C90s all day, every day, year in year out. Although Uk based, at the time I started the label for real,through writing for MRR zine and befriending folks like Pushead, I was fortunate enough to have made many contacts in USA- one was a friend who ran Seattle label Subcore which issued the debut stuff from splattercore kingsAccused.Being a huge fan of the band from afar, it was a real honour to get the ok to release the bands Martha Splatterhead LP in Uk-this became my first release, Mosh 1.At the time I had no idea about rights so they quickly expired hence the LP is no longer available on the Earache catalog.From memory only about approx 5000 Mosh 1 exist.
Spazztic Blur was the crossover-HC-thrash side project of Wermacht, a rising Thrash band of the day, based in Portland.Again, being a mega-enthusiastic fan of the band, they let me release the album which became Mosh 5.

Heres Accused :

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Biomechanical & Stone Roses connection? WTF?!


Question: why did biomechanical make a cameo apparence in the bbc blood on the turntables series? i belive the episode they featured in was the one about the stone roses. From:


Answer: Thats bizarre! But yes, you are right- see 7.40 in the video below, Biomechanical appear in the documentary about the UK's 90s breakthrough artist- Stone Roses.
The connection is both bands were signed - a decade and a half apart - to long standing west midlands Rock label FM REVOLVER Stone roses released a 1987 single Sally Cinnamon, and Biomechanical released Eight Moons CD in 2003.I can only imagine that when the film team arrived to talk to Revolver's owner Paul Birch, he took the opportunity to get them to film a bit of Biomechanical to use as cut aways in the documentary, a slight attempt to get a bit of promo going for the new band.
I agree its really bizarre seeing the 2 bands in the same documentary.Thats the connection.

Carcass in episode of FRIENDS? yes, really..

Question: So, I knew the one about Carcass circa \'89 appearing in the Red Dwarf episode \'Timeslides\' but how did Carcass manage to be mentioned in an episode of \'Friends\' of all things in a 2001 episode many years after they had split?? From: ckooistra@optusnet.com.au


Answer: We have no idea- but yes it did happen- watch this:

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Story how Earache's Video Game came about?


Hi Earache,
My brother gave me the Extreme Metal Racing Game which is in the box of Worlwide metal.It is a fun racer, which was enjoyable.I'd like to know how did Earache make such a game, because I programme my own games.
from: jamesmobrey54@hotmail.com

Answer: yeah glad you liked it- Earache is still the first Metal label with its own themed Video Game out.It was originally released on PS2 in 2007 in the UK- now we decided to make the full game available to more fans across the world, as a FREE PC game, and its included in our hella mega value Boxset "WORLDWIDE METAL".
The game came about because the daughter of a head of a smallish UK Games developer (Data Design)is a huge Earache fan, and she 'advised' her dad to contact us to make a game. I think you summed it up well- the gameplay is definately not GTA or anything- its simply a fun-racer type of game, albeit with a soundtrack of hours of Death Metal and Grindcore.You can drive vehicles around a number of tracks and kill your opponents with various weapons.STOP PRESS: a selection of Earache's tracks are included in upcoming GTA4 new episodes as DLC.
See video here:

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Classic Series & metaltracks.com


Question: Hello there at Earache,

I have two questions. First, is your Classic Series solely a European offering? I can\'t seem to find the Hate Eternal one in the US webstore.

Second, what are Earache\'s plans, if any, for metaltracks.com?

Thanks! From: invisibleoranges@gmail.com

Answer: 2 questions for the price of one- it must be our january sale offer.Our 'Classic Series' of legendary early Earache Cds with FREE bonus DVD has been really well received by fans and we love revisiting our old catalog and in many cases introducing new fans to them.The Hate Eternal offering is basically I, Monarch CD packaged with the Perilous Fight DVD (which disappeared without trace on its original release) and will soon be available for purchase on USA webstore, a few weeks after the UK/Eurostore. Typically the delay between our UK & USA release dates is due to a quirk of our manufacturing plants- they simply print & ship faster in UK than USA, where our distro picks up the tab, which delays the process.

As for metaltracks.com, it was launched in Jan 2005 and was Earache's own Mp3 download site with pretty much the complete label catalog for sale, something like 4000 tracks,all DRM-free, and reasonably priced, high quality files.Launched without much fanfare the success of the site really surprised us, fans told us it worked a treat- it was pretty much like how amazonmp3 works now- but behind the scenes it was pretty homebrew.We coded it ourselves and we have some immensely talented folks working here, but at the end of the day, we are music fans not website developers.This proved to be its downfall. Our server couldnt scale up to meet demand meaning the site went down a lot, and basic security flaws meant the site was easily open to hackers.In summer 2007 we discovered a Chinese Ip adress had penetrated the database to steal the entire contents and kill it dead- 6000 mps in one session is quite an attractive "honeypot" it seems.It remains a dead site ever since.

It was a succesful site while it lasted and gave us a steep learning curve and some harsh lessons about how some fans want to obtain music in the 'digital space'- ie they want it free.In the 4 years since launch have watched Myspace come to prominence by streaming free music, downloading it seems so old school now, so we'd consider it a backward step to reactivate the site.We do have some vague plans to once again offer Earache's music as free streams but we'd let professionals do the coding next time.

Saturday, January 24, 2009

Earache Grindcrusher LP - September 1989



Question: I wanted to know if you could shed some light on the origins and influence of the Grind Crusher compilation. I just snagged a used copy (the 24 track version) and I\'m enjoying it immensely. There\'s some weird/interesting tracks on there too (Mighty Force \"Thrashing a Dead House?\"--I didn\'t know Earache signed techno bands!)
I was also curious what you think about other compilations such as the Cry Now, Cry Later compilationss and the Relapse released \"This Comp Kills Fascists\". Insect Warfare is on there as well as other great grind acts like Brutal Truth. From: jondd87@yahoo.com


Answer:Ah thats a great question- takes me back to me youth! The version you have was released in 1991 and was an expanded 24 song edition mainly for the USA - it included more bands, and lengthy liner notes- because the plain and simple original 1989 edition (9 songs- pictured above) of the GRINDCRUSHER comp was a UK only release, as my label had not figured how to export and distribute the releases internationally at that point.
The idea for the release was to simply showcase the bands Earache had signed at the time, which was and still is, a standard label ploy, I guess I was influenced by earlier great themed comps like Alternative Tentacles' Jellybeans and MRR's 1984but Earache's compilation was pretty radical as it was the very first grindcore compilation ever to be released at retail.

It marked the debut appearances of Godflesh, Morbid Angel, Repulsion, Terrorizer and many other legendary names. Indeed the first time the actual word GRINDCORE was printed anywhere -was on the sticker of this record.That term was coined by Mick Harris of Napalm Death to describe the harsh, de-tuned,crushing grinding sound the acts were playing-it was in common parlance by all the trailblazing musicians in the scene- so I ran with the theme of GRIND.Earache also had the Grindcrusher tour planned for November of that year, to co-incide. (little known fact is Kevin Sharp travelled to UK and covered that tour as a writer for an Industry(CMJ) mag, returned with his mind blown, and within a couple years had formed Brutal truth)

Being acutely aware of the radical nature of the sounds of Earache bands- literally nothing existed in the music world that was so singlemindedly harsh & extreme prior to this- I figured the cover art ought to reflect that.I designed it to be deliberately garish, stark & colourful so as to look apart from everything else around at the time, to be apolitical, and be the opposite of a black & white, generic (and now timelessly classic) DIY/ Hardcore Punk style.Back then printing costs depended on how many colors (films) were used,making 4 color sleeves was 4 times more expensive than 1, thats the simple reason why the B/W sleeve predominated in the Punk/HC scene- it was cheaper to print.

Mighty Force were'nt techno, that scene came a bit later- they were what was termed "Industrial"because at the time, Front 242, Ministry were breaking through, and the "Belgium Beat" of T99 and Quadrophenia was considered new and highly cutting edge on the Independent scene.Anyhow the song fuses Industro-Belgium beats with Napalm Death and ENT samples, thats how the Manchester duo caught my attention.They were an early example of a cross-genre "mash-up" of sorts, but in hindsight I agree with you, the band sit really strange on the comp, looking back.

The CRY NOW CRY LATER comp was a few years later, mid 90's I think.It passed me by completely at the time, as Earache had some huge bands on our hands then- I do remember thinking those so-called 'powerviolence' scene bands were more like a return to speedy lo-fi Hardcore punk and because they typically had very few Metal touches, I lost interest.

The Comp This Comp Kills Fascists which was released by Relapse in 2008 really fascinated me as the timing was perfect for a sampler to highlight the new bands in the scene, the title itself was pure genius and evoked a retro political stance.It was tastefully done, and another Relapse success story.For me the main highlight is the superb Insect Warfare who rule.

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Carcass new plans?

Question: As Carcass have reunited in 2008 and are now active, are they still contracted to Earache? Or are bands\' record contracts terminated when they split up?

For example: There was a rumour doing the rounds about a new EP from Carcass. If this was to happen, would it be released by Earache as they\'re still under contract, or would you have to re-sign them?

Also, on the matter of Carcass releases. The re-releases were well done, the artwork was stunning and the audio extras were fantastic, but the DVD seemed a bit lacking? There are several videos doing the rounds from each tour, including the Rome date of the Heartwork tour. Could you not have maybe put on a live video from each album\'s tour, bar Swansong obviously, where there was no tour? I also feel the video for Reek of Putrefaction (which can be found on Youtube for all those who want to marvel in the sight of 400 identical close-ups of Bill Steer: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=VHWQI9ngn3o) could\'ve been included, along with something else along the lines of this, such as any Rehearsal footage or interviews lying about in Jeff Walker\'s spare bedroom.

Also, why wasn\'t Wake Up And Smell The... Carcass included in the re-issue campaign? Will it be re-released along with the DVD in your Classic range at any point?

And finally, is there any plans to release a live DVD from this year\'s Reunion tour? I know that the Wacken concert was shot professionally, for the purposes of the giant screens present. Also, would you include The Pathologist\'s Report in full? It would be nice to see it. From:


Answer: Well, whoever you are dude, I reckon you used up your quota of questions in this one- are you in the music biz I wonder? You certainly know everything about Carcass past and present so I applaud you for that.
First point- we had a 4 album deal with Carcass (well, a two album deal which was renewed once) then when the band were dropped somewhat ignominiously by Columbia Records the Swansong album ended up on Earache aswell under a one-off deal. The band are free agents because their contractual obligations with Earache were fulfilled by the time of their split in 1996 or so. Deals are not exactly terminated when bands split- unless by mutual consent- thats why a reformed Obituary recorded for Roadrunner about 10 years after splitting up- but were quickly droped.
I think its possible other labels might have some claims on any Carcass newly recorded output- post-Carcass, Jeff carried on and formed Black Star in the late 90's which signed to UK label Music For Nations (now Sony owned)-I have a sneaking suspicion they might have some claim on any new work by Carcass, but I dunno?Micheal Amott also has current record deals to consider.

Glad you liked the DVD's - we didnt include any old live gig footage because the legalities of old footage is problem area, and we have 2 perfectly killer gigs on the Wake Up and Smell the Carcass DVD- pro-shot edited gigs from GRINDCRUSHER TOUR 1989 and GODS OF GRIND 1992.It was meant to be a documentary in 5 parts,no more, no less- and no, we dont have any plans for combining them into 1 DVD, even if its obvious we do it.

Your suggestion of Wake Up and Smell CD + DVD Classic series is one we are considering though yes, it makes sense to us.

As you can tell- I'm not party to their plans, because Earache is only involved in the 90's era Carcass material, not any new material (if any were to be recorded!). My honest opinion is- I don't think the band will record any more material, and even if they did- it could'nt top what they did in the 90's- so why try?Also they'd definately have to hire Colin Richardson as producer, no one else could do it- and he's way out of their price bracket nowadays having done huge budget productions for Slipknot, Bullet For My Valentine etc.I can't see it happening.

Heres Reek Of Putrefaction clip put together for the GRINDCORE VHS (now DVD) made by UK Metal video company Fotodisk in 1989 or so:

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Cult of Luna FIRE WAS BORN DVD

Question: I was wondering if the track listing for, Cult of Luna\'s live DVD \'Fire was Born\' had been released yet? If so could you please put it up for me? Thank you and Regards, Kurt From: trukolsen@gmail.com

Answer:Heres a trailer song from the DVD, the full gig set is 90 minutes long. Any one who was there will tell you it wasn't a normal concert- COL played the set right thru, they became a mesmerising force of nature that stunning night.

Harris/Bullen/Broadrick reunion?


Question: With various ex earache bands getting back together lets talk theoretically, If in the unlikely event that it happened how much would a broadrick/bullen/harris napalm death reunion make? And also say for argument sake they took the heaven and hell route also in keeping with justin\'s thing for naming projects after the last song he did for another they toured under the name of seige of power or somthing to that effect, would it be likely to make more or less than the current carcass, sleep, brutal truth runs? From:


Answer: Dream on dude- even tho i like your logic and you are correct that there's never been a better time for old band members to put aside their differences to reform, because the fees paid by promotors and festivals are at an all-time high right now- i honestly reckon THAT WILL NEVER HAPPEN.
I also reckon the current members of Napalm Death would have kittens at the prospect of a rival Napalm Death - even under a different moniker- playing songs they still perform in their set to this day...But i've been wrong before.
The obvious name for such a hypothetical band is SCORN, and while we are in dream-land, maybe they could thrown in a couple of Scum era tunes at the end?
I reckon Nik Bullen would be the least likely member to consent, as he genuinely is not motivated by any kind of financial concerns, rating his artistic endeavours in higher regard than mere money. Fair play to him for sticking to his principles, but it should also be noted he has had a lenghty career in academia to support himself, hence commercial music is secondary.

Cock & Ball torture - Earache covers


Question: The German grindcore band Cock and Ball Torture recently participated in a split EP with Agathocles amognst other bands, where they performed \"A Tribute to Earache Records\". On this \"tribute\" they proceeded to perform Grindcore covers of famous band signed to Earache who weren\'t exactly Grindcore or Death Metal, with covers of bands such as Adema, Addiction Crew and Fudge Tunnel. Have you heard this EP and what do you think of the idea? From:

Answer: That was pretty funny, they can take the piss all they want, I don't mind. I guess the guys in C&BT don't really have the skill or technique to pull off a cover of any of our actual grind/Death Metal legends.If you compare the two bands- I honestly beleive Adema do infact sound heavier and more powerful than CBT!
I've never been a fan of C&BT, they are a really piss poor attempt at a grindcore band.Years ago we had a German kid working at Earache for a time and he would constantly bug us about GUT and C&BT, so I checked em out, thinking we might be missing something.Nah they were garbage back then and still garbage now it seems.
Agathocles on the other hand i do have time for - a decent band, Earache must have turned them down a few times in the early days- they just didnt cut it to be a premier grindcore band in my opinion.
C&BT should cover Earache's latest greatest deathcore band OCEANO, but i doubt they could manage it.

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

How to ASK EARACHE a question?


Question: How do I get a question answered on this blog? From:

Answer : To pose a question you would like answered- go to THIS ASK EARACHE PAGE on Earache's website.
If you want to know how to submit a demo to Earache, as 90% of you readers seem to do then go to THIS DEMO SUBMIT PAGE where you have to send in a myspace.com link of your band.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Carcass Symphonies CD+ DVD in USA

Question: Symphonies of Sickness 2-disc Digipack--is a US release upcoming? Avoiding a PAL conversion for the documentary I have 4/5 parts of would be nice! From: bossk33@hotmail.com


Answer: the last part of the Carcass "Pathologist's Report' collection is indeed coming out as a USA CD + DVD in late February. Its quite delayed compared to the Uk/EU Dualdisc edition, as we had to arrange a special version of the USA bookshelf box/slipcase to house all 5 of the discs so fans who purchased all 5 can complete the collection.The USA editions are fatter/wider than the UK/EU editions.

Monday, January 12, 2009

Artist-run own labels. Good idea or bad?


Question: what do you think of artist owned labels? are the way into the future or possibly a bad idea? I mean with a label being run by a band thats signed to it obviously there is conflict of interest firstly there is no quality control if a recording is rubbish and also if there are other bands signed to the label the owners can be seen preferencing their own band ( hence why isis are not signed to hydrahead even though aaron turner runs the label). Just wondering what you think being as shane and mick who are both former earache signees have formed their own label feto. From:

Answer: On paper, it sounds like a great idea for a band to sign with an artist owned label- they'd have the empathy and support from a fellow musician - but the fact is I cannot name a single successful band coming from an artist owned label.By that, I mean a new band which was discovered, signed and marketed by a label operated by a fellow high profile musician. For some mysterious reason, musician-run labels fail to deliver succesful career artists.Its positively weird if you think about it.
Looking back, some of the biggest star names in the metal biz have operated labels at one time- and none have had any lasting success.
Kiss' Gene Simmons had the much-trumpeted Simmons Records during the 80's- with an iconic logo depicting a bag of cash- did he deliver any long term artists? Nope.
Think about Lars Ulrich - one of the biggest selling artists of all time, and a real music fanatic- so he put his money where his mouth is, and during the late 90's he ran a label called 'The Music Company' releasing bands like Systematic and Goudie- ever heard of them? Nah.
Korn's Jonathan Davis ran his own Elementree Records for a while- Deadsy was a minor hit but nothing else springs to mind.
Even Ozzy Osbourne had a label- yes its true- his label was Ozz Records, through Red-Ant in the USA in the late 90's- it was notable for releasing the first Ozzfest compilation CD and lasted about 6 months.
Every Slipknot member has their own label it seems, Shawn does Big Orange Clown signing Gizmachi and the band has 'Maggot recordings' which released DownTheSun.Neither are household names eh?
Honestly speaking, I think that artist labels are for pure vanity at the end of the day.

STOP PRESS: Actually I forgot SST records the label run by Greg Ginn- guitarist of Black Flag- responsible for the careers of so many great punk/alternative bands in the 80's- its fair to say, SST was the defining, trailblazing, peerless Indie label of its time. Husker Du, Descendents, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, St. Vitus even Soundgarden began on SST. And Epitaph, the label formed by Brett Gurewitz, Bad Religions guitar player went on to break The Offspring NOFX & Rancid to worldwide acclaim.Ooops, so there goes my theory!

STOP PRESS 2: In my answer,I wasnt really discussing band's "own" labels, there are a zillion small bands who go the DIY route for their own debut albums- and even some huge bands like Radiohead and NIN, and soon Metallica, who have the fanbase in place to do the DIY thing now.I was only considering artist owned labels, and ones that show the ambition and scope to try to break other fellow bands.With mp3 files via the internet replacing the old fashioned CD retail distribution network, there has never been an easier time to do it- but its still a rare thing that an artist owned label has broken a new act through to major acclaim.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

DEICIDE music used as torture weapon?


Question: Is it true that Deicide was used to torture prisoners in Iraq? from :

Answer: Hold on there dude, Deicide has never tortured anyone -well, anyone cept thier own fans anyways!
You are referring to a news item which originally hit the wires early last year on a website MOTHER JONES which claimed that US military was using audio at loud volume to 'soften" up detainees in Abu Ghraib- it even had a playlist of the top 10 songs. Deicide's "Fuck Your God" was number 1.
Never slow to shirk from stirring up controversy, Earaches press dept quickly released a Press Release to alert the music press to this "fact".As it happens Deicide drummer Steve Asheim comes from a family with a long Military tradition, so he was all in favor of the use of the music.No one ever checked if the story is true or not.
The story quickly snowballed online and even ended up reported as fact in the UK newspaper The Guardian.

Monday, January 05, 2009

Vader on Earache in early 90s


Question: I\'ve been listening to Vader\'s The Ultimate Incantation lately (what
with them recording a bunch of old songs and pawning it off as a new album) and I
got to wondering, why did Earache only release that one Vader album? From:
tmeisenheimer@yahoo.com


Answer:Simple answer is- Earache was the very first metal label to release an Eastern European band- nothing pleases me more than to see Piotr celebrating 25 years of Vader, but in hindsight, we did Vader too early in their career, they had the talent and work ethic, but also were naive and young, plus, it was to be a few years later that the wider metal scene was accepting of Polish DM bands.

Earache was enjoying a golden period at the turn of the 90's - the death metal/grind scenes that our various bands were spearheading, began exploding all over the planet.We heard the demo of upcoming death metal band Vader, they worshipped Morbid Angel and musically they were killer, it was right up there with the best- just one handicap - they were based in Poland.

I say handicap and I mean it- this was a different era then,Poland was very recently still under Communism, it wasn't part of EU like today.The band endured a level of hardship few western acts could stomach, basic music equipment like amps or guitar was hard to obtain.Immigration red-tape meant It wasn't even certain the band could ever leave the country to tour.They spoke no English.The retail music scene consisted of bootleg cassettes sold on the street for 30pence, Cds in stores at western import prices were deemed a decadent, unaffordable luxury.It would be akin to signing an Iranian metal band today.
Still, Earache took the gamble partly because of the success Roadrunner had with Brasil's Sepultura- if a band could break out of Brasil then we figured why not Poland?

The band made some mistakes- taking 2 attempts to record the debut, the entire first recording at Sunlight Studios (Entombed) was shelved as the band seemingly were more interested in Stockholm's nightlife..the second attempt at Rhythm studios -in Uk, so we could oversee it, was the version released.
Earache paid for Vader to tour all over the planet, I remember them coming back from a USA tour loaded with goodies, not just guitars, pedals, drum parts etc but a full tattooist set up- needles, inks, spares the lot. The bands manager failed to grasp the economics of the music biz - he never grasped that the tens of thousands of dollars we paid out in tour support was recoupable from the band royalties.To be fair, many bands even today don't understand this, the costs of touring across continents of Europe and USA, are frankly astronomical for a new band.

Eventually when we weighed up the pros and cons, compared to the other Death metal bands we did, sales were poor -Vader sold 10% of Morbid Angels debut for instance- so in my view, Vader didnt warrant another album, hence, we parted with the band.