It’s Just A Tool (Albini And The Drum Machine)

Flip over a Big Black album and you’ll see the band lineup. You’ll see the expected names, including Steve Albini, and then you’’ll see the drummer. 

Roland. 

And that makes sense. Why Roland doesn’t have a last name I mean. Because Roland isn’t a person or a drummer in the traditional sense. 

Roland, you see, is a drum machine.

The only last name Roland sort of has would be TR-606. But if you add those letters, it wouldn’t be as funny. This is important.  

When you listen, it’s immediately apparent Albini understood what to do with the drum machine. 

Instead of making it sound like a real human drummer, as it was designed to emulate for demos and stuff, Albini leaned all the way into its inhumanity. 

Albini’s drum programming, aka Roland’s drumming, is an all-out attack, barely imaginable for a human to achieve. 

A drum machine is just a tool. 

With any tool - it’s all about how you use it. 

To imagine new ways to use tools, it can help to approach it with a comedian’s mindset. 

What’s funny about this? Peculiar or haha. 

One tool and Albini helped change a corner of modern music. 

Ps. Speaking of tools, don’t forget fuels as tools either - here’s “Kerosene” so you can hear the brilliance yourself

h/t Michael Azerrad and his book (maybe one of my favorite books ever at this point), Our Band Could Be Your Life.