In January of 1986 Big Black released their debut album.
A shot across the bow for what was considered extreme music at the time, the record is an all out aural assault.
Chicago industrial has arrived.
Let’s talk Big Black, Atomizer!
554 Big Black – Atomizer
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One response to “554 Big Black – Atomizer”
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Big Black has been described as having “a sound resembling a singing saw blade mercillesly tearing through sheet metal.” My question is, why? You don’t like the sound of a saw blade tearing through sheet metal. I certainly don’t. No one does. People who work in factories where saw blades tear through sheet metal wear ear protection so they don’t have to hear that. So why listen to it by choice? What would make you want to do something like that to yourself, and more importantly, to me?
It’s like food critics kind of. A million people eat McDonalds every day; but a million people eat delicious nutritious home cooked meals or at quality local restaurants every day too. So food critics should steer people away from McDonalds and towards good recipes and restaurants. That would be a productive and noble use of their platform. But that takes work and might not draw enough eyeballs. So they do write ups of the weird niche pop up that four people a night go to for clout that charges you $200 to inhale vaporized eel brain. This album is $200 vaporized eel brain. People don’t like it. It sucks. But it’s so extreme that it makes for good copy for lazy music critics to write about. So here we are.
Speaking of drawing eyeballs, Steve Albini has walked back his frequent use of racial, gender and sexual orientation-based slurs (how punk rock!) but what no one who later recants saying those types of things ever admits is to why they did it. They did it for attention. They wanted to sell their shitty noise music and have people go to their awful headache-inducing concerts and normal people were never going to do that so they tapped into the edgelord market because edgelords are dumb, have a little money and there are enough of them to sell an okay number of records. Lyrics of that nature are a commercial decision, despite being very non-commercial. Targeting a niche market is still targeting a market. It’s no different than Madonna’s metal bra or Lil Nas X’s video where he gives Satan a lap dance. It’s all manufactured controversy meant to get dumb teenagers to buy your record. So don’t get on Twitter in 2023 and say you shouldn’t have said those things because of your privilege. Give back all the money and fame you intentionally sought by saying them or sit in your Wicker Park condo collecting your interest and shut the fuck up.
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