麻豆社

Tucked away on the first floor above a coffee shop and opposite the Theatre Royal is the home of Earache Records.

Inside one of the offices you'll find Dig Pearson surrounded by boxes of CDs and rock music magazines.

Earache Records Nottingham offices

More importantly, his internet link is up and running and locked on MySpace - the music industry site, according to Dig.

In the beginning

Back in 1987 Dig Pearson was a young fan of the American hard core scene. Bands like Black Flag and Dead Kennedys and UK bands such as Killing Joke persuaded him to start promoting gigs in Nottingham.

Then he took matters one step further.

"I befriended a couple of bands who were my mates. I was a glorified manager / roadie. I sold my record collection to put out flexi discs by these bands."

John Peel

Before long Earache had signed up their most famous band - Napalm Death. More importantly, they'd come to the knowledge of the legendary DJ John Peel.

"Peel embraced what we were doing straight away," says Dig.

Napalm Death - big Earache stars

"Out of our first ten releases about eight of the bands did John Peel sessions. He put the label on the map and gave us respectability."

Staying put

Despite the initial success Dig was never tempted to up sticks and move to London.

"We have a promotional office there but I prefer to stay in Nottingham. In the 90s Earache music got popular in America. We sold a lot of records and had bands in the Billboard chart.

"A lot of my efforts went into setting up a New York office which we did in the mid 90s. I used to be there every two weeks."

The 1990s was Earache's hey day, when they earned their only platinum disc for a compilation album.

Earache Records founder Dig Pearson

Earache now

"We're a fully fledged record company in the old sense," says Dig.

"We sign bands to recording agreements and become part of their career development. Earache's still street level really. Kerrang! and Metal Hammer readers know who we are.

"We put bands in the studio, pay for it and take the risk of pressing up the CDs. We're forever hopeful one of our bands will become the biggest in the world."

MySpace plays a major part in the modern age with Dig receiving up to 20 band demos every day via the link.

Will Bring Me the Horizon be big in America?

The future

Dig Pearson and Earache show no sign of slowing. Most recently they've signed up and coming Sheffield band Bring Me the Horizon to an American deal.

They've also entered the computer game market. Earache Extreme Metal Racing has been released on Play Station 2.