Steve Albini, an icon of indie rock as both a producer and performer, has died of a heart attack, staff at his recording studio, Electrical Audio, confirm to Pitchfork. As well as fronting underground rock lynchpins including Shellac and Big Black, Albini was a legend of the recording studio, though he preferred the term “engineer” to “producer.” He recorded Nirvana’s In Utero, Pixies’ Surfer Rosa, PJ Harvey’s Rid of Me, and countless more classic albums, and remained an outspoken critic of exploitative music industry practices until his final years. Shellac were preparing to tour their first album in a decade, To All Trains, which is scheduled for release next week. Steve Albini was 61 years old.
The old fogies among us (Gen Xers I guess probably specifically) are likely very intimately familiar with many of the seminal "indie rock" etc. albums produced by Steve Albini. He was very opinionated and outspoken about a lot of the music industry from writing and performing and recording music to the business of studios and touring and labels and streaming services. A coworker who knew him though said "... contrary to popular belief [he was a] a sweet, caring and loyal person who loved his friends as much as he loved music."
Folks are probably busy with Nur Ein but maybe we should do a cover fight where folks cover songs from albums he produced?
He'd been pretty gracious about teaching/interviews about recording and such as well. You can find a bunch of neat things with him on YouTube. Too soon. I'd be game for a Cover Fight (probably just need to make a little "longer" than usual deadline for it because of Nur Ein).
You can find a bunch of neat things with him on YouTube. Too soon.
Too soon. I've listened to him for hours talk about sound engineering. His personality comes out in fun ways, he's never really says anything overtly dickish, but it's obvious he has it in him.
Damn, I'm still grieving Steve from Dead Meadow, writer of my favorite riffs, but now I have to add in Steve Albini, producer of some of the best albums?
The album that put him on my radar was definitely In Utero. Still my favorite Nirvana album by a mile.
I hadn't really looked at everything Steve Albini had done, and got to looking through his full credit list and holy crap I did not realize HOW many albums he'd recorded and by that broad of a range of people. Last one that really grabbed my attention was when he worked with Sunn 0))) for a spell.
But it turns out that he also produced the Om records, which remain in my heavy rotation to this day. And he apparently did Burning Witch back in the 90s? And...Joanna Newsom? I knew about the PJ Harvey connection (though honestly I'm more of a Stories/White Chalk era fan)
YES I am up for a Steve Albini album coverfight. I'd love to have an excuse to cover Om.
"There's a lot to be said about a full-on frontal assault on the ear drums" - Pigfarmer Jr.
Probably going to be listening to some Pigface Gub and (early) Gogol Bordello, and since I'm not going to even attempt to sing any of Eugene's songs... guess I'd be covering some Pigface (or Bush? but I don't know if he did my "favorite" Bush song, and I say favorite as in that I don't particularly like Bush, but I did like one song at one point in time...). Anyhow, this is a bummer and it shows how soon things can happen, I think he just posted a new Gear Dork video this past week.
Edit: He DID Produce (he preferred the term Engineer, I believe) my "favorite" Bush song... at least the "original" track.
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