Get ready to ramble: 21 shows you need to see before September

Music Features

A Steve Albini vitriol sampler

Shellackings

By DANIEL BROCKMAN | August 31, 2010

Big Black

The Steve Albini of today is a relatively jovial figure: hard-working, straight-talking, practical — but with the contented air of one who's been able to find his own way in a tricky field. So why is it that if you Google "Albini" + "asshole," you get nearly half a million hits? It might have something to do with the fact that, as a snarky occasional 'zine contributor in the '80s and early '90s, Albini said what everyone else was afraid to say, in a manner anything but delicate. I'm sure he would cringe at seeing these selections in print again — but for the erudition of our younger readers, here are four reasons people still approach the man with trepidation:

READ: "Pure audiogasm: Shellac's Steve Albini sets his own sonic pace," by Daniel Brockman

1. JUST BECAUSE HE RECORDS A BAND DOESN'T MEAN HE LIKES THEM |To Forced Exposure magazine, he described Surfer Rosa, the 1988 Pixies album he'd engineered, as "a patchwork pinch loaf from a band who at their top-dollar best are blandly entertaining college rock." (He later admitted to regretting this statement.)

2. HE HAS NOT ALWAYS BEEN THE MOST POLITICALLY CORRECT PUNDIT | In a 1992 Maximum Rock and Roll interview, he described the experience of being courted by Depeche Mode, who were eager to have him man the boards of their next album: "At the time, I had never even heard them, so I went to go see them at this big sports arena in London. After about two songs, I thought that 'this is horrible, these guys are the worst. What are these young homosexuals doing?' So I just split and told them that they had the wrong guy."

3. HE IS NOT A FAN OF NON-ANALOG RECORDING METHODS (OR CDS) | As he so eloquently stated back in 1987, at the height of the shoulder-padded days of DAT tapes and banks of electronic effects chains, "The future belongs to analog loyalists. Fuck digital."

4. HE WAS NOT INCLINED TO EXPLAIN OR DEFEND THE OCCASIONAL SHOCKING LYRICS HE PENNED IN BIG BLACK | From the 1992 liner notes of the posthumously released 1987 live album Pig Pile: "Anybody who thinks we overstepped the playground perimeter of lyrical decency (or that the public has any right to demand 'social responsibility' from a goddamn punk-rock band) is a pure natural dolt, and should step forward and put his tongue up my ass."

Huak + Metal Feathers at Bayside Bowl, September 24
The DJ at Bayside Bowl can't stop playing the Pixies' Bossanova. Not that anyone's complaining.
Kate Schrock picks up a backbeat
This happens in music all the time, of course: People with no obvious commonality come together because the music they make sounds good. Thus we have Kate and the Rocket.
The Molenes get dark and low-down
Roots music is a big tent. The Molenes have poked their noses into just about every corner of it over the course of their first two records, trying out everything from bluegrass to rockabilly and moving from ripping twanged-out guitar solos to more refined acoustic finger-picking.
Maine storyteller heads away for audiences
We here at the Phoenix don't pull this kind of thing often, but this weekend you're missing out. Lewiston native (and Munjoy Hill dweller) Michael Parent has headed 1000 miles southwest from Portland to the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee, this weekend.
The State Theatre: This is actually going to work
There's no question that the reopening of the State Theatre has people in this town pretty damn excited. As photos of the reconstruction have leaked out, the fever has built, often almost completely irrespective of that bands that have so far been lined up to play its stage.
Cuban and Brazilian imports, plus homeboy Ran Blake
Groove isn't everything, but it'll do.
Review: Elvis Costello | National Ransom
Back in the late '70s and early '80s, Elvis Costello would plot his cosmic knowledge of music history into his own songs, as if they were booty for like-minded music geeks.
Review: oOoOO | oOoOO
As much as I love a solid song or a monstrous riff, I will always tip my hat to those at the fringes of the music world ...
Review: Darkstar | North
For evidence as to why labeling subgenres of electronic music is tedious, look no further than this debut LP from UK collective Darkstar.
Review: Avey Tare | Down There
It's a credit to Avey Tare that his debut solo album feels like a very natural extension of Animal Collective's overarching brand of psychedelia.
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Self-released (2010)
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