Steve Albini E-Mail About How Much He Hates Dance Music Turned Into Billboard Advertisement

Diagonal label boss Oscar Powell also releases music as Powell via XL. His latest single, “Insomniac” (coming soon on XL), features a vocal sample from Steve Albini that dates to his time fronting Big Black. Ahead of its release, Powell emailed Albini to get sample clearance and explain how much Big Black’s music meant to him. However, as the Quietus reports, Albini gave more than his approval—he also included a long rant on how much he hates dance music.

Powell asked if he could use the e-mail to promote the single, and when Albini responded, “still don’t care,” the text was turned into a billboard by XL. It can be found on London’s Commercial Street. Check it out above, and read the e-mail below.

Although he says he hasn’t heard “Insomniac”, Albini wrote:

I am absolutely the wrong audience for this kind of music. I’ve always detested mechanized dance music, its stupid simplicity, the clubs where it was played, the people who went to those clubs, the drugs they took, the shit they liked to talk about, the clothes they wore, the battles they fought amongst each other…

Basically all of it: 100 percent hated every scrap.

The electronic music I liked was radical and different, shit like the White Noise, Xenakis, Suicide, Kraftwerk, and the earliest stuff form Cabaret Voltaire, SPK and DAF. When that scene and those people got co-opted by dance/club music I felt like we’d lost a war. I detest club culture as deeply as I detest anything on earth. So I am against what you’re into, and an enemy of where you come from but I have no problem with what you’re doing…

In other words, you’re welcome to do whatever you like with whatever of mine you’ve gotten your hands on. Don’t care. Enjoy yourself.

Steve

Read our list of Albini’s 10 best records.

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