The Heart Of The Clatter
INITIALLY AN UNLIKELY CANDIDATE TO START A METAL LABEL, KARL WALTERBACH FOUNDED NOISE RECORDS IN 1983 AND WENT ON TO CHANGE THE FACE OF AN ENTIRE SCENE FOREVER
In the unstable world of the music industry, instinct and intuition are invaluable commodities. When Karl Walterbach founded the legendary Noise Records back in 1983, he was undoubtedly using both. A diehard punk rock fan from Berlin, Karl didn’t even like heavy metal when he branched out from his earlier project, Modern Music: a prolific underground label primarily dedicated to German and US punk bands. Having started in the DIY scene, putting on shows in basements and squats in Berlin’s Kreuzberg district, Karl had forged a strong relationship with US-based SST imprint and, through that, hardcore punk legends Black Flag, and it was through this international meeting of minds that Noise emerged.
“In fact, Greg Ginn [Black Flag guitarist] introduced me to metal,” Karl says today. “Every time he played in Hanover he was raving about the Scorpions. I didn’t understand it because I found them goofy! But in Los Angeles he took me to some of their shows with local metal bands, and then I was more interested. That was the time when the first Metallica and Slayer records and the first Metal Massacre compilation album from Metal
Blade came out. I took all that stuff home and I thought, ‘This is great stuff, it’s so out of the box!’”
It’s not hard to see the parallels between the punk underground and the nascent thrash metal scene that caught Karl’s eye. Metallica and Slayer were kickstarting a musical revolution and it was one that knowingly shunned the polish and politeness that were deemed necessary for mainstream success.
“Punk was in decline and I could see something exciting in the metal scene,”
Karl recalls. “So I started Noise, picked up a few bands and did compilations, including the so-called Death Metal compilation in
’84. I signed Grave Digger, Hellhammer, Helloween, Running Wild and Kreator… but if I was signing bands today I probably wouldn’t sign a single one of them! Standards are much higher these days, ha ha ha!”
Having taken a punt on the metal scene, with a firmly European focus, Karl had inadvertently stumbled upon a handful of bands that would go on to completely alter the face of heavy music. More traditional fare like Helloween and Running
Wild would have a great impact on the power metal scene that erupted during the late 90s, but it was the signing of a peculiar band of Swiss youngsters called
Hellhammer that would send the strongest ripples around the metal world, as they soon transformed into one of the most influential bands in metal history.
“Hellhammer was a copy of Venom, and a bad copy!” Karl laughs. “Venom had balls, even if the music was very badly played.
It was that bigger-than-life image that I liked. If I look at Hellhammer it was there too, the same vibe, and then they turned into Celtic Frost. They really stood out and made an impact. It was a lesson learned because you really need big balls as a band to stick out and be different. Today there are so many copycats all over, and that’s a shame.”
Signed to Noise Records when they were still teenagers,
Kreator were effectively the label’s response to the burgeoning
US thrash scene. Now firmly established as one of Europe’s most revered metal bands, Mille Petrozza’s crew brought new levels of intensity and chaos to thrash, as showcased on their thrillingly primitive 1985 debut, Endless Pain, and its immortal follow-up, Pleasure To Kill. Today, Mille cheerfully regards Karl’s decision to sign his band as a miraculous event.
“We were incredibly surprised that anyone wanted to sign us!” he laughs. “A friend sent Karl our demo tape, but we didn’t feel like we were as good as other bands at the time and we were still very young. My mother had to sign my record contract! I was only 16 or 17 years old at the time, so it was like, ‘OK, let’s make an album…’ It was a once-in-a-lifetime chance and maybe we’d never get to make another album, so we just hoped it would sound cool. That was our career plan, ha ha ha!”
More than three decades on from signing with Noise, Mille is happy to salute his former collaborator.
“Karl was always very supportive and if he hadn’t signed us, maybe we would have signed to a shitty label that wasn’t able to support us in the same way,” he muses.
“Noise was the perfect label for us at the time. I don’t think a major label would’ve touched us, so we’re very thankful.”
Kreator were soon joined on Noise by thrash brethren Tankard, Coroner and the UK’s own Sabbat: proof that Noise’s contribution to the European thrash scene cannot be overstated. Karl was also savvy enough to look to the other side of the Atlantic and sign progressive Canadian oddballs Voivod, who were momentarily unsigned after releasing their War And Pain debut via Metal Blade in ’84.
“We moved to Montreal in the summer of 1985 and started working on our second album, Rrröööaaarrr, but we had no record deal,” drummer Michel ‘Away’ Langevin explains.
“We had our gear stolen and were living above a strip bar downtown, getting poorer and poorer. But we organised a big show in Montreal with Celtic Frost and we gave a rough mix cassette to [Frost bassist] Martin Ain. He took it back to Europe, gave it to Noise and we ended up with a threealbum deal. It was an amazing turn of events!
“Thanks to Noise we have great memories of being in Berlin to record our album, Killing Technology, in 1986,” the drummer continues. “It was very strange, because the Berlin Wall was still there. We tried to get to East Germany a couple of times but they said we looked funny and we had to turn around, ha ha ha!”
Albums like Celtic Frost’s Into The Pandemonium and Voivod’s Dimension Hatröss brought unprecedented levels of creative bravery to heavy music, and it’s impossible to imagine today’s metal scene looking even vaguely similar without their impact. However, Noise Records’ greatest commercial triumph belonged firmly in more traditional realms, as early signings Helloween rocketed from nowhere to international glory. Widely viewed as Germany’s answer to Iron Maiden, at least at the time, Helloween’s second and third albums – Keeper Of The Seven Keys, Parts 1 and 2 – made them chart-busting heroes around the world, much to Karl’s delight.
“They sold a million worldwide, with gold records in Japan and Germany,” he recalls. “It was really amazing. Those are huge numbers for an independent label. That’s why Keeper 1 and 2 stick out in my memory. Helloween had great songs. They had the cool, cartoonish image. They sounded fresh and young and they had the looks. It was the perfect mixture at the perfect time. But it can kill a label, a big success like that. You’re constantly re-pressing the records, 50,000 or 100,000 units, and you’ve got to pay the bills! One day I received a call from the pressing plant and it was the owner, saying
‘You owe us 400,000 Marks! This can’t go on!’ I said, ‘But I’m a big hit!’ and he said, ‘That’s great, but I don’t care. Send me some money!’”
after the good years came the not-sogood years. The 90s was a tricky time for metal generally, of course, but Helloween’s success at least enabled Noise to enter the decade in good shape. Unfortunately, a proposed deal with EMI Germany involving Helloween and several other acts disintegrated into a flurry of lawsuits that briefly threatened to kill the label off. The courts eventually found in Karl’s favour, but the musical wind was blowing in a different direction and so he took the plunge and moved to Los Angeles for the rest of the decade.
“I needed to change my life and to get some fresh air!” Karl recalls. “We survived the lawsuits but I became very demotivated. It’s logical that metal would decline.
Any successes we had in the 90s were overshadowed by changes in market tastes and then the internet changed everything.”
Despite having notched up some huge triumphs while changing the course of heavy music on several occasions, Karl witnessed the dawn of the downloading age and realised the music industry was about to implode.
He sold Noise in 2001 and has since been working in management, still helping bands but from a different viewpoint.
“Ultimately, how can you compete against free music?” he shrugs. “I was ahead of the curve and sold up for a decent price. I sold my publishing company in 2006 and its value had decreased by three-quarters. That tells you what happened to the industry.”
2016 saw a series of lavish re-releases from Noise’s inestimable catalogue, including classic albums from Celtic Frost, Voivod and Kreator. Damn The Machine, a book detailing the life and times of the label that must surely rate as one of the smartest leaps of faith ever made, was released in March (see Tome Raiders, right).
“No, I wasn’t a metalhead but I just felt that something was brewing all those years ago,” he concludes. “I liked the energy and the attitude. What matters is persistence, building a fanbase, good live performance and identity. If you play metal, you’re in there for the long haul.”