The Nirvana engineer and Big Black frontman was 61

Steve Albini, one of the leading lights of indie rock sound and morale as the frontman of Big Black and Shellac and engineer for Nirvana, PJ Harvey and many other artists, has died at the age of 61. The news has been confirmed diversity on Wednesday by Taylor Hales, who works at Albini’s Chicago recording studio Electronic Audio; The cause of death was a heart attack.

Albini first gained widespread recognition in the early 1980s as the frontman of Big Black, the Chicago-based trio known for aggressive, guitar-based rock that employed a drum machine rather than a live drummer, which was unheard of at the time time was a rarity. However, he was also known for his equally aggressive criticism of musicians and others who, in his opinion, were more concerned with money or popularity than the music – and he did it like he was talking about it. He despised the term “producer”, although he probably did so on many recordings, and insisted on the label “Recorded by Steve Albini”. He also refused to take any “points” – royalties, a common financial bonus for most top producers – from the recordings he worked on.

His at times iconoclastic demeanor – and his stirring work on the Pixies’ groundbreaking 1988 album “Surfer Rosa” – endeared him to Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain, who insisted that the band work with Albini on their second major label album, ” In Utero” from 1993. ” Much to the chagrin of their label, who were hoping for another speaker-busting blockbuster similar to the group’s breakthrough, “Nevermind.” (“In Utero” was pretty loud, but not as radio friendly as they wanted.) Around the same time, Albini also recorded PJ Harvey’s sophomore effort, “Rid of Me,” which had a similarly aggressive sound.

Albini also worked with acts such as the Breeders, Slint, Helmet, the Jesus Lizard, Jon Spencer, the Dirty Three and even former Led Zeppelin members Jimmy Page and Robert Plant on their 1998 album Walking Into Clarksdale. The latter album in particular benefited from Albini’s spare, straightforward sound, which was at odds with the duo’s elaborate recordings of today.

In the early 1990s, Albini formed the band Shellac, which released five studio albums over the years and was preparing for a tour later that year to promote its sixth album – and first in a decade – “To All Trains”, which is scheduled for release next week.

He was also the founder, owner and chief engineer of Electrical Audio, a recording studio complex in Chicago. Even now, Albini still took on production gigs for a flat fee and refused to pay royalties to show his support for his indie artists.

Albini was born on July 22, 1962 in Pasadena, California. His family moved frequently before settling in Missoula, Montana, where Albini discovered the Ramones as a teenager. While studying journalism at Illinois, he joined Chicago’s vibrant punk rock scene, which he never really left.

He began recording as Big Black in 1981 and played almost all the instruments on the group’s snappy first release, 1982’s “Lungs” EP. The lineup of Albini, guitarist Santiago Durango and bassist Jeff Pezzati solidified himself and the group They quickly became popular and popular. They were active in the emerging US indie rock scene, releasing three EPs and two full-length albums before breaking up in 1987. While Albini and the band were sometimes seen as iconoclastic and judgmental – and they often were, particularly in the diatribes Albini wrote for fanzines like Matter – their music had a major influence on left-leaning hard rock for decades, from Godflesh in the late ’80s up to Idles today; An ’80s band called Head of David began the thank you list on their debut album with “Big Black Sabbath.”

The band’s sense of humor has also often been overlooked – their last album was called “Songs About Fucking”; Their last single featured covers of songs by Kraftwerk and Cheap Trick, and the cover comically featured the band dressed as those artists – but some attempts at humor didn’t go down well: Albini’s first post-Big Black band bore the unfortunate name Rapeman, which he later regrets. While he argued that the ironic intent of his lyrics should be obvious for songs whose titles use deeply offensive terms — not to mention a limited-edition Big Black album cover featuring an autopsy photo of a gunshot suicide — that distinction certainly wasn’t the case always clear at first glance. He only admitted this much later.

“Many of the things I said and did from an ignorant, privileged position are clearly terrible and I regret them. “No one is obligated to overlook this and I feel obligated to redeem myself,” Albini wrote on X (formerly Twitter) in 2021. cruel, and all under the silent work incorrect I had the impression that things were getting better. It’s overdue for a conversation about my role in inspiring “Edgelord” shit. Believe me, I have experienced many punishments while performing, and I feel sorry for anyone who is not like me but still had to suffer from them.”

Around the time of his success with Nirvana and PJ Harvey, he formed Shellac with bassist Bob Weston and powerful drummer Todd Trainer. The band recorded and toured extensively throughout the 1990s and 2000s. In his later years, Albini began a working life in Chicago, working indiscriminately with most artists who asked him, touring and releasing albums with Shellac, and becoming a very successful professional poker player. In 2018, he won a World Series of Poker gold bracelet with over $105,000 in prize money – and nearly doubled that jackpot with a second win four years later.