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Steve Albini has died

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Re: Steve Albini has died

#91

Post by gizajob »

TylerE wrote: post #83
mgkimsal wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm trying to reconcile that 'plumber' against George Martin with the Beatles. He was paid like a plumber for the first couple years, and... EMI treated him with such disdain that he ended up leaving. I'm sure the money was much better after he left, but... had EMI just been slightly nicer to him, they'd have owned him for many more years. That said, I think his relationship with his bands opened up areas for him to…

Martin was so involved in the creative process he was closer to a 5th bandmember, and was sometimes called such by the Beatles. He had more involvement in the creative product than most producers, including writing and arranging the strings, brass, and winds parts that are all over later Beatles records, and appeared as an instrumental performer on over 25 Beatles tracks.

So much that EMI have been fixing his work for 60 years now, in particular his decision to split the Beatles tracks arbitrarily between the two speakers for all the stereo mixes, despite the Beatles personal involvement in the mixing process for the mono mix downs which sound infinitely better.

Re: Steve Albini has died

#92

Post by brnacl »

In 2009 my band traveled from Nashville to Chicago for the honor of recording with Steve at Electrical Audio. We loved his drum tones and his use of analog tape in a live band setting.

He was quirky, brilliant, quiet, and kind of hilarious to work with. He wore disheveled blue coveralls with a lowercase "e" on the back for 5 straight days.

They fed us as many lattes we could stomach for all hours of the day, and he didn't even care if we smoked cigarettes the entire time. Slept on cots in his building, while he stayed in his "personal" area.

Watching him cut 2 inch tape the old fashioned way was one of the nerd highlights of my life. RIP Steve, and thank you.

Re: Steve Albini has died

#93

Post by ilamont »

brnacl wrote: post #92

In 2009 my band traveled from Nashville to Chicago for the honor of recording with Steve at Electrical Audio. We loved his drum tones and his use of analog tape in a live band setting. He was quirky, brilliant, quiet, and kind of hilarious to work with. He wore disheveled blue coveralls with a lowercase "e" on the back for 5 straight days. They fed us as many lattes we could stomach for all hours of the day, and he d…

Besides working with analog tape, what else in his process was either surprising or a revelation?

In the interview with Conan and Dave and Kris that someone linked to earlier (https://www.earwolf.com/episode/dave-grohl-krist-novoselic-a...), he really tries to disabuse Conan of the notion that he is wielding "magic" ... he basically says it's Dave setting up a regular set of drums in a room that has good acoustics, he mics them, and presses "record" - he is just trying to capture the band as a band making music together in a room. He said it was similar to what Butch Vig did with Nevermind before the suits forced them to use a different sound and effects in post.

Although someone else in the interview did mention that he had special German microphones ...

Re: Steve Albini has died

#94

Post by quickthrowman »

BoingBoomTschak wrote: post #33
quickthrowman wrote: post #5

Oh man, that’s terrible! I was waiting to hear when the next Shellac tour was going to be taking place, as they’ve got an album coming out next week. I’m a huge, huge fan of Big Black, Rapeman, Shellac, and Steve Albini’s production (Nirvana’s In Utero, Pixies’ Surfer Rosa, Jesus Lizard’s discography, PJ Harvey’s Rid of Me, Brainiac’s Hissing Prigs in Static Couture, Songs:Ohia’s Magnolia Electric Company, plus hundr…

His very close-miked sound still containing a tasteful (i.e. light) amount of reverb is such a recognizable signature... A true legend, and big coincidence since I discovered yet another of his production a week ago: Zeni Geva's last three LPs. Almost as important as the ubiquitous Dan Swano in my collection: $ find -L ~/Music -type f -name album.json -exec jqmusic '.credits | has("Steve Albini")' {} \; -print | awk…

I will check out Zeni Geva, thanks for sharing!

Re: Steve Albini has died

#95

Post by rurban »

ilamont wrote: post #3

Hard to overstate Albini's influence, both as a musician and producer. Big Black? No one was doing stuff like that in the mid-80s. His production on PJ Harvey's Rid of Me took her compositions to a new level. He also produced a lot of very fine albums in the 80s and 90s by the Pixies (Surfer Rosa), Nirvana (In Utero) and various albums by The Jesus Lizard, Superchunk, and others. Yes, he was cantankerous. Marched to…

He was a legend as musician, and as producer, despite destroying PJ Harvey's Rid of Me. What a major fuckup!

Anyway, the way he talked and explained the music business was always legendary.

Re: Steve Albini has died

#96

Post by The_Blade »

nonrandomstring wrote: post #77

In my mind, Albini holds a plain speaking American slot besides Hunter S. Thompson, for the similarity of these remarks: "I imagine a trench, about four feet wide and five feet deep, maybe sixty yards long, filled with runny, decaying shit." - Steve Albini "The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negati…

Henry Rollins

Re: Steve Albini has died

#99

Post by bjw4 »

Sad to hear Steve has passed.

I met Steve, Bob and Todd at Camber Sands 2001 very briefly, really nice people who didn't act like rockstars at all. Q&A sessions, banter with hecklers, Todd talked about his dog (an Italian Greyhound) a bit.

Friends band recorded at EA, only possible due to charging a low flat fee and no royalties based on who they were - incredible work ethic that has influenced me greatly.

Listening to "Terraform" tonight, and maybe Spiderland by Slint after.

Re: Steve Albini has died

#100

Post by SourPatch »

BoingBoomTschak wrote: post #33
quickthrowman wrote: post #5

Oh man, that’s terrible! I was waiting to hear when the next Shellac tour was going to be taking place, as they’ve got an album coming out next week. I’m a huge, huge fan of Big Black, Rapeman, Shellac, and Steve Albini’s production (Nirvana’s In Utero, Pixies’ Surfer Rosa, Jesus Lizard’s discography, PJ Harvey’s Rid of Me, Brainiac’s Hissing Prigs in Static Couture, Songs:Ohia’s Magnolia Electric Company, plus hundr…

His very close-miked sound still containing a tasteful (i.e. light) amount of reverb is such a recognizable signature... A true legend, and big coincidence since I discovered yet another of his production a week ago: Zeni Geva's last three LPs. Almost as important as the ubiquitous Dan Swano in my collection: $ find -L ~/Music -type f -name album.json -exec jqmusic '.credits | has("Steve Albini")' {} \; -print | awk…

Steve also played with Zeni Geva as Superunit: https://www.discogs.com/release/876551-Zeni-Geva-Steve-Albin...
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