Disclaimer: I in no way take lightly, am unsympathetic to experiences of nor, least of all, condone rape. I have known both women and men who have been sexual assault and rape victims. My contact with these issues on a personal level has fixed my stance to be staunchly intolerant of the moronic "cultural" insensitivity that arises around these issues. However, I am an enemy of any kind of censorship or inhibition of freedom of speech, including PC-motivated forms of this. If the issue exists in our society, it must be talked about. Making people afraid to use the word 'rape' or address the fact - in any light - that such inhumanities exist is several steps backwards in regards to ever resolving or dealing with such an issue. Music has been the only platform for much discussion of omnipresent social taboos over at least the course of the last half a century and more. I refuse to accept that there is any subject that cannot be addressed through music and lyricism as we have very thoroughly closed so many other doors to avenues of discussion of these topics culturally. With that, I give you both one of the most controversial and influential bands of the 1980s:
Whether you love or hate him (I go back and forth), Steve Albini's impact on electric guitar-based music, record engineering and independent music making is indelible. While his assumed "politics" (remember that term audio-politics I coined?) and overall anti-populist approach to every aspect of the music business has polarized general opinion of him, the sonic signature he left is far from being forgotten. This short-lived, highly provocative follow-up band to his Big Black, named after a disturbing Japanese manga series, are an example of Albini's musical memorability, in spite of negative public reaction. The fact that the comic book which the band cited as the source of the
name garnered nowhere near as much criticism (if any at all) from protesters of the band evidences a late 80s PC mentality that was not in search of addressing larger issues but prefered they be skirted and not
brought up at all. In case you were wondering, the music here is not overly offensive nor explicit, in fact I'd say less so than most of Big Black's output. Sonically, this is confrontational music, like the rest of Albini's catalog. Being the first band of his with drums, there are amazingly audible similarities to the sounds of bands he would later engineer, such as Nirvana. Vocally, Steve really comes into his own here, defining the soft/loud approach that would mark the grunge era. The recorded sounds themselves are impressively defined, marking the beginning of his thorough 'precise presentation of performance' style of strategic mic placement and minimal effects/overdubbing. Nods to the Cockrock canon of bands like Golden Earring and ZZ Top, with numbers like Radar Love Lizard and a cover of the latter's hit, Just Got Paid, continue what I see as Albini's career-long satire of rock patriarchy. This is where I feel the lyrical subject matter of Big Black, Rapeman and Shellac are most widely misconstrued. It is one thing to be a man making rock music with other men obliviously, another to self-criticize and try to eschew that cliche and another entirely to try and embody all the negative implications of the cliche. I, for one, commend Mr. Albini for his attempt at the latter. After all, isn't that what punk was all about?
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