I am affected enough by the death of Steve Albini that I just went on social media about it, though just a generic vale, not to brag that I do have a very meagre connection to him, having spent a day with him in, I suppose, 1991 or possibly 1990, doing some recording. But the impact of his death from a heart attack of all things hits harder because only last week I listened to an interview he did with Andy Richter where he does talk quite a bit about what his retirement would look like.
The day mentioned above was a quick recording session, three songs, for an EP Mark Perry was making, the songs ultimately came out on some cobbled-together ATV album, they're nothing outrageously special. Stephen O'Neil played on the session as well (very sick with flu), I think it was just the three of us. John Henderson had arranged for the session paying Albini not in money but in translations of Polish bowling magazines, you couldn't make that up. But it was incredible to see his working methods at close hand, the hands-on tape editing that didn't just show a dedication to analogue (I assume that sustained)* but also a sureness of hand that seemed to be one more element of not so much confidence as a belief in a 'right way' based in common sense logic. He carried that into his life philosophies which were revolutionary in context but shouldn't have been. He also frequently credited his cat (at that time, Floss) as engineer and sometimes as producer - I saw her name on many tape boxes. I am pretty sure I met Floss, too.
*Another recollection - he chided Henderson for buying/dealing in CDs because he believed they were not as long-lasting as vinyl. No-one had anything good to say about vinyl in the early 90s.
No comments:
Post a Comment