Noise Records
Noise Records was a German music label that focused on heavy metal .
Noise Records was a sub-label of the Sanctuary Group , an international company , since 2001 through the sale of the company "Modern Music Records GmbH" . The heavy metal label, like the punk label Aggressive Rockproduktionen, was founded by Karl-Ulrich Walterbach and has made known many rock and metal bands that are still important today since the 1980s .
Company history
In 1981 Karl-Ulrich Walterbach founded the independent label Modern Music Records GmbH. In the first few years only punk from German-speaking groups ( Slime , Daily Terror , Toxoplasma , compilation series “Soundtracks zum Untergang”) and US punk ( Black Flag with Henry Rollins , Hüsker Dü , Misfits , Angry Samoans etc.) were published. Through the close cooperation with Black Flag and their label SST , Walterbach also came into contact with West Coast underground metal bands such as Saint Vitus in 1983 . From this the label Noise Records developed in 1984 , which initially specialized in European Thrash bands such as Kreator , Tankard and Celtic Frost and then also released bands of other metal styles such as Helloween , Running Wild , Grave Digger and Rage . In the early days there was a two-year collaboration with the Metallica label Megaforce Records from New York, from which the thrash metal band Overkill was licensed and, in return, Grave Digger was released in the USA via Megaforce.
Noise Records' most successful band was the Hamburg speed metal formation Helloween in the late 1980s , whose Keeper of the Seven Keys albums achieved top chart positions worldwide with sales of over 1 million for the Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 2 album alone .
A label deal in 1990 with the German EMI for 4 bands (Helloween, Running Wild, Celtic Frost, V2 ) was short-lived, as the Helloween management contracted the group directly with the British EMI in a breach of contract. The subsequent legal dispute was decided by the German courts in terms of Noise Records and after a two-year legal dispute settled out of court. As part of the comparison, Helloween then went its own way.
By joining the label T & T Records in 1993 as a sub-label of Noise Records , they strengthened themselves in the melodic area (Virgin Steele, Stratovarius, Elegy etc.) and through the collaboration with the Berlin label "Hellhound Records" in 1994 in the area of Doom Metal .
The productions of Noise Records found worldwide distribution through sales and license releases (approx. 42 countries). They had their own offices in the USA and Great Britain. The label was sold to the British Sanctuary Group in 2001 .
After the takeover by Universal in August 2007, Sanctuary Records was closed as an independent label. This also meant the end of Noise Records.
Noise Records Bands (selection)
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Web links
- Noise Records at Discogs
- From Anarchy to Art, article about the label founder Karl Ulrich Walterbach, taz from August 28, 2004.