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The Root of It All

How we listen to music has been changing for more than a century, but since the rise of streaming, musicians are being left behind.

The music industry is leaving brilliant artists high and dry. What do we stand to lose?

Great jazz drummer Milford Graves was an innovator in every sense of the word. The definition of a polymath, he did so many things, from botany to computer science, at such a high level that it was hard for those in the know to think of him as any one thing. However, one little-known thing is that young Milford was also an early pioneer of independent records, meaning he was one of the first musicians to record, press, and release his own. Even lesser known is that he was responsible for introducing John Coltrane, one of the biggest of the jazz names within the major label pantheon, to this idea near the end of Coltrane’s life.

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Steve Albini in the control room at his Electrical Audio studio in Chicago.

Photo by Kevin Tiongson

Words of wisdom from the legendary engineer, proprietor of Chicago’s Electrical Audio, World Series of Poker champion, and, in the band Shellac, the compass for brutal guitar aesthetics.

“All day every day, we’re grinding it out,” says engineer Steve Albini of his team at Electrical Audio, the Chicago studio he built and has run since 1997. “We’re constantly in session, constantly under fire.”

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The upright bassist, whose credits read like a who’s who of jazz greats, shares on his early musical career, which began when he was just 13 years old.

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By approaching your electric bass like a string player, you’ll find easier ways to get around the fretboard.

When I began playing in ’80s London, there were no electric bass teachers and no programs that recognized it as an instrument. It was like the Wild West, with most making it up as they went. I had to play upright in college in order to get in, and there was no jazz program, so I studied classical. I chose classical guitar as my second instrument, because I thought studying the technique might be useful. Over the years, I developed my approach by taking useful pieces from all these different places, in addition to what I picked up from watching or listening to great players. One of the most important areas I spent time on was fingerings and positions.

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Don’t wait ’til mixing to get a great tone. Record your sound as best as you can to make your tracks shine.

Recording bass can be a challenging task. Whether we are talking about a natural, woody upright-bass tone that balances well within a jazz quartet, or a nice, round electric tone with definition and copious amounts of low end for “modern” situations, the science behind how to achieve these sounds has eluded more than a few engineers and players. As both a player and as a recording and mixing engineer, I wanted to pass on a few tips that have served me well over the years.

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