Steve Albini on the state of the industry

If music is going to be free, then everything music creators need should also be provided free of charge. Some sort of special card issues by the government?

I mean, that's communism, isn't it?

Actually, the deeper understanding of Albini's point of view is if you look at what kind of music he likes....and that he is quite literally NOT a professional musician. Being in a band who occasionally plays a gig does not make you a professional musician. Moreover, huge amounts of the music he adores is made by amateurs. It would be like a big band leader writing an essay on how who needed shitty electric guitars and overdubbing anyway. It's not WRONG....it's just myopic.

He doesn't like or respect any music made by songwriters. Meaning artists recording material written for them....or written by people who are not performers. While his Phil Collins joke is funny--he's a funny guy, what about the MILLIONS of people who bought Phil's albums and tickets over the years--see that's what his POV misses--he says you can get the "best of whatever you're into"....and lists some kind of punk rocker's idea of what musical genres might be--in generic terms....as if Phil Collins or Prince don't have fans. Or better yet--let's look at James Taylor. What's 21 year old James Taylor's plan in this? Play your tunes with just acoustic guitar at coffee houses (as if those exist anymore--thanks Starbucks)...with no band, or a band of amateur players who just love playing his songs, since he can't pay them....maybe throw up some mics and put that on Soundcloud....and try to grow a following enough to give you starter money (via Kickstarter or wherever) to record with the hot shot musicians he's ALWAYS had on his records? Or maybe rather than living and writing and devloping his own unique style on the acoustic, 21year old James should buy EZ Drummer and a DAW--figure out how to engineer his own recordings....and sequence drums and pianos and whatever--and play bass as awkardly as most acoustic guitarists would....put that DEMO....up on SOundcloud or give it away at gigs...

I'm getting longwinded, but my point is--his amatuer punk rock scene is but this little scene that yes--WAS severely underrepresented by the label system, so that did little for any music he loves. He's been vocal about that for many years--and not incorrect at ALL, if you share his love of passionate garage rock bands. So, he's not WRONG--he's just not seeing the bigger picture. Or is completely OK with the bigger picture--which would involve no one being a professional songwriter. No one being a professional session OR touring musician in support of singing artists--but, every singer needing to find their own full time band who is both good and willing to work for "fun"....or "getting the chance to play with them". The componentizing of songwriter....and singer....and sessions musicians....and touring musicians....is a construct of an industry that made no music he loves--so, of course he is ok with that outcome.

As always, JMO
  The whole tour to make money thing is BS, the vast majority of talent isn't interested in doing that. Albini's faux punk example of a band from 1975 being discovered now because of the internet, and relaunching a touring career at the age of ?(at least 60+ years old?) is a fucking absurd example, it's pretty clear that he's just selfishly/disingenuously trying to secure his anti establishment brand IMO, kinda blows his cred, i stopped reading there.

  News bulletin for U2 and Mr. Albini, Giving away music for..cough..."free", reinforces a tragic paradigm, devalues your own work, and that of your peers and clients, end of story.
  As for talented artists trying to make a living, survival instinct is a paramount human condition, artist will sacrifice wealth, and even comfort to do what they love for a living, but if you take away their ability to eke out the most meager of livings, they WILL NOT, and you will see the cream that used to rise to the top, give way to more turds floating in the shitter at an ever increasing rate.

Satisfied isn't a glowing recommendation. It's a realization you have it pretty good considering the situation around you. Not unlike a welfare recipient that says the economy is good, if you were one of the few well paid survivors in a collapsed industry, you would be pretty satisfied too.

I wonder what his opinion is of current music and musicianship that he has to record and listen to for hours on end. That would be my downfall. I would spend a lot of time outside the control room.

ReRead my post. The level of musicianship HE works with hasn't changed--he has never worked with accomplished musicians. He actively loves garage rockin noise making punk. That is the music he loves....hich fuels this POV.

This is the same yahoo who didn't take points on "Nevermind" and now admits in the new "Music Highways" show that his studio goes under about once a year. Nobility at the price of survival is stupidity.

Jim, I see where you coming from and I'm not your typical struggling artist, because i don't have to live on my income from music, so I'm probably not a good example. I might not even be qualified to join this discussion at all. I have a well-paying day job that lets me build a comfy home studio with selected high end gear and enjoy it and the music I make in there. I agree, I could not make a living from music these days. Even in the days when I was very active as a writer and had a bunch of major label releases, I was struggling to make ends meet. And that was the primary reason I took up a day job. There was rent to be paid and food to be bought. And cats to be fed...

Right, Dave Grohl and Nirvana, The Breeders, Pixies, PJ Harvey, all shit musicians. 

Actually his band Shellac is pretty accomplished too.


I know a few very top level musicians that make money touring and selling their own music. Real music, not dance music, thank god. It's not big money but enough to live off of.

Bob Olhsson has noted elsewhere that the overall level of musicianship has gone down, and musicians aren't matured through live experience in the same way as they used to be. This is definitely true. On the other hand, I see this as primarily the fault of television and big labels, where producers and staff are hired to manufacture acts for maximum profit, saturation and turnover.

I doubt the pop acts today would have made the cut as performers even to become backing acts in the 1960s. I can't think of any pop singers today who compare to Motown's artists or Dolly Parton.

So I also blame engineers and producers for propping up singers and musicians who have very little vocal or original songwriting ability or performance talent. You think Steve Albini does this? All he does is record people for money, he doesn't fix bad performances, and he doesn't produce to market targets, so I thank him.

It's just a lot more efficient to throw money until it sticks and inundate people from a young age with bad music until they don't know the difference rather than find and nurture talent.

Touche - you're right...Welcome, joseph!

Sorry to offend. When dealing with most any pop/rock music, you're nearly always dealing with "how unaccomplished" the musicians are compared to nearly any other form. That's why I use that word....not "shit".

Jackson Pollack isn't an accomplished painter because people love and buy his art that involves use of paint and canvas. Nor does it mean Jackson should "learn to paint"....do your thing...people love it...more think those people are delusional. But, Albini's opinion becomes devalued when he comments on the state of an industry that he couldn't stand anything it produced.

Musicianship is all about listening to your fellow musicians in performance and adjusting your feel. That's true whether you're first desk in the Berliner Philharmoniker or playing Soul or Rock and Roll. Music is either good or bad, not important or not.

Whether you agree with him or not, Albini's views are perfectly valid. He worked with some of the biggest acts of the 90s, and has his own feelings about how the big labels treated them and the recording process and how it affected their artistic output, especially Sonic Youth.

Let's not forget DGC people screwed with both Nevermind and In Utero after the recording sessions.