Ok, I plan on ordering some basic cleaning stuff tonight then, an antistatic brush and microfibre cloth. Hopefully this will be enough to reduce the noise and then at least I know that the only problem is dirt and not in my setup.
Then, later down the line when my bank accounts recovered from this setup, I'll buy a more deep clean approach, I'm hoping that as this record is new, it won't need a true deep clean just yet.
I wouldn't worry about your setup being the cause of the noise you've described.
Anyone old enough to have been into vinyl the first time round will tell you that the lack of clicks, pops, rumble, scraping sounds, hissy surface noise etc. is what they loved most about the invention of the CD.
The best vinyl can sound great, play a well-recorded 45 r.p.m. 12" disco single and you might be surprised just how great.
But I'm not surprised your problem was noticeable between tracks.
I've digitised some vinyl. Part of the process meant zooming in on the waveform to remove pops and clicks. When you see the noise between tracks it's actually quite shocking.
A few Rega owners have commented on hum / buzz problems, but you've got no problem with that by the sound of it.
(Hopefully you've at least got
perfect silence when the stylus is off the record).