Steve Albini's (Shellac) - response to heckler

"Your'e really sexist!" - Metro Theatre, Sydney Australia

[@johnmorrison8618]

Steve is zero bullshit, genuine dude. He handled this very pro.

[@theformernihilist9891]

@Anderson Cooper Seriously I could give a fuck less.

[@nomadben]

@Anderson Cooper Yes, people don't ever change through decades of life experience. I'm sure he's exactly the same person he was when he was in his twenties.

[@kjmmxii123]

When I saw Shellac in Manchester (UK) in 2017 a heckler tried to tell him he had the drums mic'd up wrong. I believe it was an ironic heckling, but the look on his face was priceless.

[@iawnlad]

Hahahaha that’s so good

[@weakbrainthrombosis]

There stands the coolest nerd ever born.

[@everyvillainislemons7583]

Indeed

[@hellvixen4808]

King of thy Nerds, lol.

[@SpiritsOfAnotherDay]

Pretty Much ✨

[@johnmchugh8049]

Never mess with a dude who wears a blue mechanic jumpsuit when recording bands

[@AnonymousAccount514]

RIP

[@sstaners1234]

I like how he engaged the audience and not glossed over them like so many artists do.

[@johnmchugh8049]

Heckler obviously doesn’t know how vicious Steve can get - he’s actually pretty tame here

[@martinradcliffe4798]

Albini has heard and dealt with every possible heckle at this point in time.

[@llllllllllllllllllllllllll4479]

I was at this show, maybe 3-4 metres to the left of where whoever took this footage . I think a few things are hard to gauge from the video, yes this happened during the improvised spoken monologue in the song 'Wingwalker', but I am unsure as I think most people there were, along with Steve, what this was directed at in particular. I don't think it was this exact song, but sure, taken at face value, a lot of Albini's music has what you'd call pretty 'coarse' themes. He absolutely didn't leave stage though, absolute horseshit comment there. He didn't stop or not complete the song, and I don't think anyone would say it really derailed or interrupted the evening very much for a band that routinely invites themselves to be heckled.
Again, not sure if the recording picks this up clearly, but after that was shouted out (presumably) at the band, a few guys closer up starting cheering and shouting stuff to the effect of 'invite her backstage Steve'. I would say that he looked magnitudes more uncomfortable at this heckle. There were a lot of real music blog type guys at the gig, which was I guess way bigger a thing in 2015. I was standing near a few yuppie types that were extolling Steve's work on records he didn't do, like Doolittle and I think the earlier Nirvana stuff. During the invitation to ask questions, when Steve retuned, there were a few slightly cringy questions with people trying to ask them about other alternative acts (I think Godspeed) which Bob Weston was pretty hilariously snappy about. If he didn't like a question he'd say 'Don't care' and move on. I think everyone, even the askers had a laugh at that. Another unusual thing I noticed was, hecklers aside, the audience was pretty mixed, with a lot of the front row below the camera line being shorter women, not that crazy but I guess interesting and maybe not immediately apparent given the context of this video.
This was one of, if not the best gig I've been to. Very fun. I remember this incident but I wouldn't say it was too characteristic of the night. I would say the portion of the audience more interested in Steve's 90s alt rock producer credentials than the music he was playing were possibly more indicative of band/audience interactions.

[@lunixcaptain]

I want 10 minutes of my life back.

[@bleeknoir]

I can’t imagine how annoyed I’d be as an audience member if a fellow attendee tried to take the intensity out of a masterpiece like Wingwalker.

[@coffeehigh420]

I wish Steve had gone into a rant about analog recording techniques using a multitrack session. hahaha

[@nikdevilish1671]

was there, it was fantastic.

[@brianarguello7576]

What song was this in relation too?

[@jackburton3540]

do you have any idea why she said he was sexist?

[@FU05241960]

​ Brian Argüello Doris Wingwalker, most likely.
@@jackburton3540 He once had a band called Rapeman, also he's famous for saying a lot of edgy things over the years often construed as racist, sexist, etc.
He's now a politically correct yes man.

[@jackburton3540]

@@FU05241960 I know about rapeman, and I love his music, but I'm relatively new here. Do you have any examples? The only thing I can think of is fists of love (which is a great song)

[@iainmacdonald8099]

Steve is a guy that makes me value art.. I love his attitude !

[@NicholasSantangeloDrummer]

... and the story concludes with me saying the words, "the plane".
Enters Bob Weston BRUMRUMRUMRUM.

[@thegimpsometimes5937]

That’s not sweat, those are all tears.

[@MrAlterface]

T-posing and pushing the button.

[@bethlabortionclinic]

"Your'e" is misspelled. And Steve is not sexist. But you have to remember that Steve's lyrics are sometimes written from the perspective of someone who is, just think "Songs about fucking", but the man himself is not. I've met him several times in person and his last response about wanting to continue the conversation later is totally sincere.

[@teddyrannila4424]

Since you feel the need to correct obvious spelling errors, perhaps you should be aware that many textbooks frown on starting sentences with the word "and" or "but" like you have in your insightful comment. Maybe you should ask Steve what he thinks about this the next time you two get together for a nice chat.

[@teddyrannila4424]

You also forgot to capitalize the word "fucking" in the album title. That's three grammatical errors in one comment, so the person who shared this video made less mistakes than you did by pointing out their error. That's pretty funny.

[@bethlabortionclinic]

Whoosh!

[@meredithyayanos1767]

Steve Albini is a straight (passing?) guy and an extremely, aggressively loud and combative artist who communicates rather inflexibly at times. Of course he's sexist. Arguably, there ain't a man on earth who isn't sexist. Hell, if I can own my own internalized misogyny, a straight white iconoclastic subterranean rock star certainly can. This man absolutely has said and done some misogynistic stuff over the course of his long and illustrious career. He's also staggeringly brilliant, and clearly, well-intentioned. So I have a lot of time for his music and his conversations. The heckler isn't wrong. Albini is also not incorrect to say there have been other times where her assessment was more relevant. I think we all need to stop thinking about these things in absolutes.

[@robertjameson530]

>women
>chill, hip, or cool
read schopenhauer LMAO toastie roastie

[@burritoburlap]

RIP❤

[@oooBUBU7ooo]

There's a really good article online in which he discusses the reasons why he wrote his most controversial songs in the way that he did, it's very interesting

[@hereforaniceday708]

do you have the link?

[@oooBUBU7ooo]

Tom Battell sure, here it is www.listenlistenlisten.org/stevealbini/

[@sequenceleaflet6568]

oooBUBU7ooo Thank you for sharing this! It cleared up a lot of questions I had concerning him. I've also shared this link with a couple of other users in different threads on this video who I thought may appreciate it, however I'm afraid I did't tag you correctly. Sorry, I find RUclips mobile confusing...

[@oooBUBU7ooo]

Spam Mule Hair Fish don't worry, I appreciate it anyway!

[@this_is_angel74]

RIP Steve

[@saint999ish]

Grandmother Albini is the airplane baba yaga over NYC 2001

[@CS-sf1rz]

Steve is the best

[@raingirlcat2245]

Rip

[@sydbarrett5]

What's wrong with being sexy?

[@soundfieldsensemble5494]

Fekn omg, this is fkn gold. My lost dark brother.

[@Watts660]

Brilliant!

[@brianarguello7576]

What song was this in relation too?

[@estif69]

Wingwalker

[@LL-bl8hd]

It's a tune called "Women Are Inferior and Their Only Purpose Is to Serve Me (Steve Albini)".

[@juancitolimon8743]

ese bajo del final jsjaj

[@goldenhourkodak]

Turn your phone the other way

[@mytorment]

Hmmm Steve Albini has a really nice microphone 😋😇🫒

[@hankscorpio8928]

Fucking epic response.

[@Lengstrom]

I don't get it
What's sexist?

[@Dan-vi3pi]

UMMMM ACKSHUUALLLYYYYY

[@diltonx6066]

push the button.

[@DaveAnchovies]

only albini gets away with this, but he's had the right idea all along.

[@user-qh5ex5tl1g]

He couldve been a great stand up but im glad he wasnt lol

[@Gollas4k]

I suppose with the situations in his life where this discussion would have some more "teeth" he means his 80s band being called rapeman with song names like for example "kim gordons panties" 😀 Don´t get me wrong, I view albini as some kind of semi god and I love the music of rapeman but that name is fucking ridiculous (and he´s aware of that, as he said in interviews)

[@doodleydoo2369]

The name came from a Manga. He just thought it was funny and didn't think his audience was dumb enough to think that the name of the band glorified such actions. He's also been in the limelight for most of his life and people grow and develop.

[@upshitdownshit4200]

@@doodleydoo2369 What manga

[@doodleydoo2369]

@@upshitdownshit4200 It was called r***man

[@upshitdownshit4200]

@@doodleydoo2369 Crap didn't think it was that straight forward.

[@doodleydoo2369]

@@upshitdownshit4200 I would say google it but the manga IS pretty messed up.

[@oo-ru5lt]

He got fat but he's still the coolest punk rocker to me

[@Koettnylle]

False. Only thin punkrockers can be cool.

[@oo-ru5lt]

@@Koettnylle the man is dead now, show some respect. ironic that his weight probably contributed to his heart disease though

[@Koettnylle]

@@oo-ru5lt I was being ironic

[@Llllltryytcc]

@@oo-ru5lt how is that ironic

[@EtcEtcAndEtc]

I think she meant generally

[@thepuppethead1188]

well yeah,hence why he said "I could think of several instances in my own personal history" et cetera. He's just saying that it was odd to have that conversation at that exact time,not that it didn't make sense to have that conversation at all.

[@monsieurmitosis]

Of course she meant generally. Steve is generally sexist. Men are generally sexist. Women are generally victims of sexism. These are all familiar tiresome assertions, but they still happen all the time, even in the most random of contexts.

[@Zoevandyne]

@@monsieurmitosis Jesus Christ stop being a drone i beg you

[@monsieurmitosis]

@@Zoevandyne Make me a sandwich, if you can figure out how, and I might consider it.

[@movimentodoscacos]

@@monsieurmitosis boring.

[@mytorment]

He's a sexist
I am putty to Kim Deal

[@benfrowen94]

an edgy teenager in the body of a 50-something year old man. love it.

[@jdessell]

Whenever you're a genuine person and are honest with your lyrics and fanbase you're bound to piss off a few people. Especially in today's politically correct, everyone's a victim, culture.

[@jamesroach1180]

Steve seems to be very respectful of pronouns and understands privilege constructs. Just watch his interview with Ian mckaye

[@petarticinovic2710]

Was he heckling Abini about the child pornography thing?

[@anonamouse.p4115]

TROLL, ALBINI genuinely apologised for that and you bring it up in the wake of his Death. You sad and gutless individual.

[@masterskeletor662]

he handled it okay but it irked him enough to walk off stage after a little sarcasm.. this guys faced lines of hecklers outside his shows. gutsy and everyday guy approach that doesnt sit well with more than one sjw..

[@sequenceleaflet6568]

Master Skeletor Were you there to see him walk off or something? In the video it seems they just continued playing where the monologue interlude ended. I assume he didn't want to seem dismissive which is why he addressed the accusation.

[@End-Result]

What the fuck does this have to do with "SJWs"?? You do realise he grew up listening to anarcho-punk bands like Crass, right? You gonna call them SJWs as well? Silly derp.

[@marsoblivi0n945]

They continued playing🙄

[@celebralpelosi5031]

such an open minded guy unless you are black or female lol