Monday, April 27, 2009

Earache package tours down the years


Question: Back in 2007, I remember reading an interview with Evile where they were talking about a \"forthcoming\" UK tour with Municipal Waste and SSS. While Waste and SSS have toured together, nothing ever came of a 3-band tour? What happened?

Speaking of Earache tours, have you ever considered reviving Grindcrusher? Was there ever any intention of making a follow-up after the original tour? If you could put together a \"dream Grindcrusher\" tour of Earache acts today, who would be on it?

Also, you wouldn\'t know the reason behind why Fueled By Fire have been replaced on the Bonded By Blood UK tour by Cauldron, would you? From:


Answer: Evile have only shared the stage once with Municipal Waste & SSS, that was in August 2007 at Liverpool Barfly.I dont think the bands can ever arrange their schedules to tour together, they all have different agents and differing plans, but you never know, it might happen one day.

As for Grindcrusher- Earache hit on the idea back in the 80's that if 2-3-4 new bands on the rise can tour together as a package, it makes the label's job of promoting them easier as it becomes possible to brand the tour, give it a name and identity which in turn attracts more attention from fans and magazines, than if the bands toured separately on their own. Promotors have known this for decades, see "Clash of the Titans Tour", labels had even done it before - the 70s Stiff Tours' etc. Nowadays it seems nearly all tours come with a branding, a list of sponsors, and a massive line up, its totally commonplace now.

We did the original UK GRINDCRUSHER tour of 1989 which featured BOLT THROWER, CARCASS, MORBID ANGEL & NAPALM DEATH.This tour was only about 8 dates but it really cemented the bands reputations in the UK. See photos.

As the bands' popularity spread to USA with the releases selling well there (I licensed the albums to Combat/Relativity for a time) it was decided to run a USA version of the Grindcrusher aswell in 1991 with a line up of NAPALM DEATH, GODFLESH & NOCTURNUS. This tour was huge, 4000 people showed up for it in LA, but this show became infamous as it was marred by insanely vicious rival LA gang violence.Read photographer Kevin Estrada's report of the fatal stabbing which happened right in the moshpit during Napalm Death's set.

Nowadays I think the dream-package tour might involve Earache bands past and present, that would be interesting for me, but I highly doubt it could be made to work because all the bands have differing people taking care of their business (agents, managers) and differing plans.
Personally, I'd be excited to see a concert of MORBID ANGEL, CARCASS, SLEEP, MUNICIPAL WASTE, EVILE & opening up,our new LA HM band WHITE WIZZARD - shit, I would pay good money to witness that gig- perhaps even 5,000 of you lot would show up with me, I dunno.

You ask about FUELED BY FIRE being replaced by CAULDRON on the UK leg of the BONDED BY BLOOD European tour coming up in May.Simple reason is that the UK leg of the tour is booked by a different agent (Earache actually) than the European leg (Insano booking).Earache wanted to showcase our new HM act CAULDRON here by adding them to the bill.The UK leg is a last minute addition to the lengthy Euro tour which had been planned for ages.It meant plans for flights and visas etc had to change at short notice, but FBF didnt fancy changing their travel plans for a measly 5 uk shows, which is fair enough, and decided to drop off the UK leg, as did SUICIDAL ANGELS from Greece. UK line up is BONDED BY BLOOD CAULDRON and local openers, MUTANT in London. EU line up is BONDED BY BLOOD, FUELED BY FIRE & SUICIDAL ANGELS.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sorry Dig, had to set the "L.A." story straight on that dude's blog...

"Um, I was at this show. There's plenty of video of this exact same show too. You got a young Phobia singer grabbing the mic, pits ON the stage...I know of the stabbing, but reports kept putting it at outside the venue (I had to bail before Godflesh's set for stupid reasons). There were NO gangbangers wearing (visible at least) "Venice" gear etc. I was one of the only white kids there, 16 maybe 17 tears old, and I certainly didn't fear for my life. There should be video up from this show on youtube. Bart Kapitzke, formerly of Extinction of God zine I believe would have shot this video.

Way overblown story man."

GLORIOUS TIMES said...

Bart Kaptizke, now that's a name I have not heard in many years.