Category: Blog

As a kid, I got into Bowie, Punk then Joy Division via my two older brothers’ records, and then formed my own taste from listening to John Peel or reading Melody Maker, Sounds, NME and watching Snub TV. Surfer Rosa was a seminal record, with the natural feel of the recording. Kim’s voice, Frank’s scream, and the mesh of guitars. John Peel played a lot of the acts Steve recorded and they cut through; Scrawl, Smog, Palace, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Man or Astroman, Dianogah, Shannon Wright, Slint. Hearing some for the first time like Smog’s “I break horses” was like time stopped and a doorway to a new world of musical possibility opened up.

Someone gave me the URANUS 7” in 1993 to see if I wanted to review it for the student paper at De Montfort in Leicester. I didn’t have my record player so took it over to Ian, Scotty and John’s, and Ian and Scotty and I listened. I didn’t get it but filed it in my memory for later.

I’d chosen to study at De Montfort because it had the Princess Charlotte venue where Jon Spencer, Palace, Man or Astroman played. Later, Ian would put on Smog, The New Year and lots of Albini-related acts. We met Matthew Barnhart who was TM/FOH for The New Year and he’s mastered almost all our releases since we made a label.

Listening to John Peel on his radio show talk about the All Tomorrow’s Parties festival in 2002 that Shellac curated, I can remember him saying he’d had a chat with Steve who had a lot of exciting projects planned and he was a big fan of his work and bands. This year, while listening to a more recent interview with Steve, he expressed how sad he was when John Peel died because he had mattered to so many bands, so many listeners and had affected many changes to people’s lives and the world of music and had been kind to Steve.

I felt that loss for both.

When we started Damnably it was inspired by Homestead, Touch and Go and Sarah Records. Especially Touch and Go’s quality of acts, doing their own thing but still all fitting together as a cohesive catalogue. We don’t work with bands because we think they are going to make us money, or have large streaming or social numbers, we work with them because they are great. I can remember Steve saying bands should make the music they want to make as best they can and if people like it, it’s a bonus. There’s no point trying to write to please an imaginary audience or A&R.

We’ve promoted many shows in London for a lot of acts that Steve had recorded, including Bitch Magnet, Stinking Lizaveta, Scawl, PW Long, David Grubbs, Shannon Wright, Bottomless Pit, Uzeda, Bellini, Chris Brokaw and more. I probably (definitely) asked them all about recording with Steve. Stinking Lizaveta told me he let them stay at his house and was super nice.

My favourite Shellac show was the daytime show at The Garage in London on January 1st, 2011, after they had played with Sonic Youth the night before at the Hammersmith Apollo (we went to both). The Garage show was great, no support, just them playing for 2 hours and everyone loving it.

When I had to reschedule recording at Electrical Audio with Steve when my mother died, it was no bother. We went 5 months later, he was super helpful, attentive, wanted ideas, super funny and patient through panic attacks or fluffed bits. He told us about all the good places to eat locally, and made us those legendary fluffy coffees. He let us let ourselves out, totally trusting and super cool like a way smarter older brother. My guitar playing isn’t that good and I’d neglected to think about the singing, but the drums and bass are super well recorded, and it was a dream come true for us.

As a label, when our bands start getting traction and attention from well received releases or successful tours, is when we often receive emails from “producers” (or a producer’s manager) to explain how they have produced Grammy winning releases and they have ideas about how those bands should sound. Albini worked to capture a band’s sound and their ideas, and wouldn’t have the time or inclination to be cold calling to tell someone from another country and scene that their music (which already had caught their attention) sounds shit and could sound like something else and he’d be the one to fix it. That’s the difference between being great and unsolicited dick swinging.

#ThankYouSteveAlbini