It’s been announced today that Century Media Records is partnering with Earache Records for a new licensing agreement. The three year deal will see Century Media handling all of Earache’s physical product distribution in the U.S. Earache previously partnered with Caroline Distribution/EMI for distribution.
Earache’s U.S. label boss Al Dawson had the following to say about the new deal:
“I am over the moon with our new arrangement with Century Media. Both Earache Records founder Digby Pearson and myself have known Century Media owners Oliver and Robert for 20+ years and I couldn’t think of a better team of people to be working with moving forward. Earache has always been a progressive minded label. From being one of the first independent labels to having our own website back in the early 90’s and to being one of the first labels to work directly with iTunes and doing business with Spotify since day 1 in Europe.”
Century Media North American President Don Robertson had the following to add:
“It’s exciting times in the world of metal and I am ecstatic to welcome aboard Earache to The Century Media Family in our time of growth. Being able to dive into the catalog of records that so many of us grew up with and being able to re-release cool limited editions will be a lot of fun and we are particularly excited to be working with and continuing to build future releases from artists such as Rival Sons, Oceano and THE Browning.”
It should be noted, though, that this only pertains to physical distributions (CDs, LPs, etc.). Earache’s digital distribution will remain in-house. Still, this is definitely a major merger for Century Media and its ever-growing roster.
[additional information via Billboard.biz]
