This Track Is Fire!

Note: this week, in honor of the legendary  Steve Albini's  birthday, I am highlighting his impressive audio engineering work (he refused to be called a "producer"). These five posts are a small example of his musical prowess, selected by me, just a fan with a blog. Certainly I was aware of who Albini was and his importance in the state of music prior to this album, but I am starting with this one because of how surprised I was to see his name in the credits. Dogs  was released on a very small label, Socialist Records, but the version that I became aware of due to NPR playing it was the re-issue from Touch and Go Records in 2004. That was the first time I had heard of Nina Nastasia. The fact that it was such a small label shows what's great about Steve Albini: he didn't care about how big of an artist you were or how big your label was, if you produced good music, he wanted to work with you. I love that! He was well-know to have a sliding scale for his services. A...

I've been listening to Nina Nastasia for the better part of 20 years now, having discovered this album via its reissue that was highlighted on whatever episode of what show I was listening to on NPR. I remember distinctly driving on the expressway from work back home as I listened to "All Your Life." Though the song is not about this, the repeated line "she's never coming back..." struck me, despite me being in my early 30s, it reminded me of my first real relationship, by first love from my college days. It was like Nina was singing from the future, a siren song to my former self, hearing the words that I knew I had to accept when I was in my early 20s. It's strange, because at the time I was dating the woman I was going to eventually marry (and later still, divorce), and had been in a few different relationships between that relationship and my current one, but the words were still what my heart needed to hear at 21-22. It had been an old wound that ne...