Producer stories

By the end of 1992, the "Nevermind" hurricane had finally given way to a bit of stability within Nirvana's camp. The band had managed to take a break from promotional duties and retreat into the comfortable calm of a recording studio, aiming to start work on their hugely anticipated third album. It was the same studio where, a few years earlier, Jack Endino had produced "Bleach", though by now it was called Word Of Mouth rather than Reciprocal. Cobain wanted to "record new ideas on 8-track with Endino, take them to a 24-track studio with Steve Albini, and then pick the best versions".

The fatigue was palpable. Over the two days of October 25th and 26th (devoted mainly to instrumental takes), Endino was struck by the strange tension among the band members: "The atmosphere seemed tense. There was little communication with me, and little among themselves. They spent almost the whole time chasing the right drum sound, one that would be 'Albini-style'. The only real question Kurt kept asking me was: 'What do you think, should we get Albini to produce the record?' It was obvious the label was pushing hard for a 'Nevermind 2', while the band felt completely differently".

Albini had long been an obsession of Cobain's, dating back to the "Bleach" tour (he'd been blown away by the sound of the Pixies' "Surfer Rosa" and the Breeders' "Pod").

"We were driving to Madison in 1990," Novoselic recalls, "with something produced by Albini playing in the background, I think it was 'Surfer Rosa.' Kurt was sitting on a little couch against the back door when he suddenly raised a finger and said: 'That's how our snare drum is going to sound!' It sounded like a royal edict, proclaimed from a couch instead of a throne, but its first effect was to blow out one of the van's tires."

For Cobain, Steve was the only person capable of shaping the new record, whose punk attitude had to be decidedly superior to "Nevermind."

Nirvana left Word Of Mouth without telling Endino when they'd be back to record the vocal parts. They left the tapes there, labeled for the occasion with the words "S. Ritchie" — both a joke (a reference to Sid Vicious's real name, John Simon Ritchie) and a way to throw off the scent of any would-be snoopers (the tapes stayed in Endino's hands until 1998, when they were handed over to Novoselic to begin work on the "With The Lights Out" box set, ed.).

Meanwhile, rumors of a possible involvement had obviously reached Albini himself too, even though at that point he had never actually been contacted: "The press had written it so many times that I was dealing with that story on a daily basis. It wasn't just people on the street asking me about it, but also potential clients and other bands, and it clearly had a positive effect on my business. In the end I sent a letter to the papers saying: 'I have never been contacted by Nirvana and had no contact with you whatsoever before printing this statement.'"

After the denial was published, the band's management finally decided to get the hiring process underway.

Steve's reputation rested both on his time in landmark bands of the American noise and post-hardcore scene (Big Black, Rapeman) and on the uncompromising way he handled his dealings with the record business, which he considered guilty of selling off everything spontaneous that rock could offer. He was clearly the right man for Cobain, even though he had never seen Nirvana live: "I knew a lot about the band, I'd obviously heard their record, but I couldn't really call myself a fan. What changed my mind was seeing how they worked in the studio."

To spell out the terms of their collaboration, Albini sent Nirvana a famous letter of intent (made public only for the 20th anniversary of "In Utero" in 2013), the most notable excerpts of which read:

"I think the best thing you could do at this point is exactly what we were talking about: put out a record in a couple of days, with unobtrusive but high-quality production, and no interference from the suits upstairs. If that's what you have in mind, I'd love to be a part of it. If instead these days you find yourselves quite constrained by the record label, so that you feel held back and sometimes yanked around on a leash (and by things like being forced to redo a song/part of it/the way it was produced, maybe bringing in some guy hired by them to sweeten a track, turning the whole thing into a remixed piece of shit, or things like that), well, you're making a mistake I don't want any part of.

[…]

For me the band comes first: I see it as a creative entity that expresses both its own personality and its own style, but also as a social entity made up of people who live in the world 24 hours a day. I don't think it's my job to tell you what to do or suggest how you should play. I'm happy to speak my mind (if, say, I think the band is doing a great job, or conversely, that it's getting something wrong — that's part of my job, after all), but if a band decides something needs to be done a certain way, I do it. I love leaving room for chance and chaos. Producing a record with no visible seams, where every note and syllable is in its place and every kick drum hit is identical, is really easy. Any idiot with enough patience and money can pull off that kind of travesty. I'd rather work on records where things that actually matter come into play, like originality, personality and enthusiasm."

During the preliminary talks with Cobain and Grohl, Albini took the opportunity to ask if he could deal with them directly and avoid having to answer to the record label. Everyone said yes, even knowing that plenty of people at Geffen were starting to bristle.

The record executives' displeasure was, however, offset by the obvious financial upside, since Albini had asked for a "measly" $100,000 and, as always, had refused to claim any share of the royalties. What's more, the recordings would take place at the same studio where Steve had recorded PJ Harvey's "Rid Of Me," the low-budget Pachyderm Studios, located just outside the small town of Cannon Falls (a fairly remote location, ideal for keeping outside distractions to a minimum).

The band had booked Pachyderm under the name "The Simon Ritchie Bluegrass Ensemble" and arrived in Minnesota in the second week of February, but not before sending Albini the tape of recordings they'd made in January at a studio in Rio de Janeiro (on the side of a two-show mini-tour). That tape held several songs, including an early version of "Heart-Shaped Box," which Cobain had already earmarked as a potential single.

"It was material I preferred to 'Nevermind' right from the start," says Albini. "That record was too confined within its own parameters. Every song had a beginning, a middle section, an end, and everything was laid out so you could listen to each block on its own. This new material, even though it still leaned on sprawling, chaotic compositions, had some truly powerful and dynamic moments. It really felt as if they'd taken a conceptual pause to figure out who they wanted to be, and above all, what they wanted to sound like."

Recording began on February 13, 1993, sticking almost without exception to a schedule that ran from noon to midnight (with only a dinner break). "We were isolated," Novoselic admits. "I don't know how we survived two weeks in a house in the middle of nowhere, gulag-style. There was snow outside, we couldn't go anywhere. We just worked."

The first day was devoted to "Scentless Apprentice" and "Milk It", two tracks that immediately won Nirvana Albini's trust.

Novoselic again: "Some of those tracks came out in a single take, and it impressed Steve so much that he abandoned his pose of standing with arms crossed in front of the recorder and started nodding his head in approval."

For Albini, "Milk It" and "Scentless Apprentice" were the two songs that best exemplified the band's great leap forward, the clean break with their earlier style, and the clear attempt to do something for themselves.

On February 14th came the first full rehearsal of "Pennyroyal Tea" (a song Cobain claimed to have written "in about thirty seconds," though the lyrics "took a little more than half an hour"), completed on the 16th along with "Heart-Shaped Box", while in the following days the basic tracks (almost all recorded live) were finished for the entire album.

Earnie Bailey (the band's guitar tech) was kept constantly updated on the studio progress: "Grohl described to me at one point an idea of Albini's, which involved hanging microphones from the ceiling and swinging them back and forth over the drum cymbals. I don't think they ever used those takes, but I was thrilled, because I liked the idea of something chaotic making its way into the recording."

To record the vocal parts, Cobain took about six hours in total. His delivery had improved considerably since the days of "Bleach", and without the need for double tracking (doubling the vocal recordings) or other effects used on "Nevermind", it was possible to hear more clearly what Kurt was capable of as a vocalist (Albini recalls in particular the vocal track on "Milk It", a striking example of Kurt's talent for conveying his unease to the listener).

As usual, most of the album's lyrics were revised right up until they went into the studio, scrawled hastily in a notebook Cobain always carried with him.

Mixing was completed in just five days (at a pace of two or three songs per day), during which nothing more was needed than adjusting the mixer's faders until a satisfying balance was reached.

The sessions ended on February 26th, celebrated with a big collective cigar-smoking session. "It worked exactly like any session I do," Albini stated. "The band shows up, everyone knows their parts well, we set up the gear, we create, we play, we add a couple of things, and in the end it all comes together. It was very, very simple." Albini also claims to have built a good relationship with the band members: "They had an openly playful attitude about things. I liked that a lot and enjoyed their company. Kurt was more withdrawn at first, but I think that was just because he didn't know me and had no reason to trust me. I didn't try to get to any kind of intimate level with him, out of respect for the pressure he was already under every day from people trying to get close to him. I decided I would give him the distance he wanted. It was obvious that whatever was going on in his head mattered to him just as much as whatever was going on between him and other people."

Up to that point, everything had gone exactly as planned from the start.

But the road to the release of "In Utero" was still a long one.

In the following two weeks (during which the track order for the record was decided) Albini heard from no one. Then the silence was broken by a phone call from a Chicago Tribune journalist, Greg Kot, who claimed to have just spoken with Gary Gersh (A&R at Geffen), according to whom the record wasn't ready for release and would need to be remixed from scratch. Albini quickly realized the news was already public knowledge: "It seemed like everyone I ran into already knew about the problem and had already formed an opinion. Most of them had advice for me, and most of them had advice for Nirvana too, and none of that advice was really smart, because everyone was pronouncing judgment from a position of ignorance. In a way, I was in a position of ignorance too, because I wasn't there when the band had discussions with the label. All I knew was that when we finished the record, the band was happy."

Gersh's statements (he was firmly convinced the record could sound much better than it did) began to shake even Cobain and co.'s own certainties, and they started wondering whether enough time had been devoted to the songs during mixing. They decided to let their closest friends (like Bailey) listen to the record to get some feedback. The material was tested on various types of home and car stereo systems, and in the end it was decided that the main problems were the bass sound and the vocal mix.

Cobain finally called Albini to share his concerns, as did Novoselic. "Kurt asked me to redo some mixes," Albini recalls. "I said, 'Okay, which songs are we talking about?' Kurt started off with a couple of details but ended up saying they wanted to redo everything. Krist thought the bass was too undefined and Kurt thought that on some tracks the vocals didn't come through enough, but they were all minor points. That was more than enough to convince me of the climate of fear they'd been breathing. They had made a great record, but the label and all the other harpies in their lives had managed to convince them they had something to doubt."

Kurt more than anyone tried to articulate his position, because he felt uneasy with the people running Geffen. He wanted to win back their trust and slam a new product down on their table, telling them these were now meaningless concerns, but Albini wasn't willing to negotiate on the matter: "If we'd gone back into the studio to redo the mix, it would have ended up being another 'Nevermind'-style situation, where at a certain point the record was taken out of their hands" ("Nevermind" had originally been mixed by its producer, Butch Vig, but after listening to the first six songs the label suggested bringing in a fresh "pair of ears." The choice fell on Andy Wallace, who had previously worked with Slayer, though his work on the record actually sparked decidedly mixed reactions from the band, ed.).

Albini again: "I called Kurt and told him, 'Look, if you want to redo the work with someone else, you have my blessing. But regarding the subtleties we're talking about, you can't change any of them without substantially altering the way the musical material is presented.' I knew that if it were changed at that point, part of the record's greatness would evaporate. And I didn't want to have anything to do with that decision."

The papers began running headlines saying that, to avoid a commercial disaster, the new album would be remixed by Andy Wallace, who was indeed contacted again. This partly confirmed both that the band didn't actually have that many objections to the sound of "Nevermind," and that, in order to settle the matter with Geffen, they were now willing to take the easier route.

Wallace, however, had a full schedule, and the band had to turn to Scott Litt (better known for his work with R.E.M.), although in the end only two tracks were actually remixed, "Heart-Shaped Box" and "All Apologies." Litt brought everyone to Bad Animals studios in Seattle, where Cobain recorded an additional acoustic guitar part and some backing vocals on "Heart-Shaped Box." The tremolo effect during the guitar solo was removed, and the record was then passed on to mastering veteran Bob Ludwig (who had already worked on "Nevermind").

Although seemingly minor, the changes to the material never convinced Albini. In 1996 he gave an interview in which he stated that the material had been subjected to a narrowing of the dynamic range, a reduction of the stereo width, and an excessive emphasis on the midrange frequencies. All choices that, to his ears, were aimed at softening the sound and making it vaguely palatable for radio programming (anyone wanting to form their own opinion and venture into a technical comparison can easily find Albini's mix of "In Utero" online).

Even today, this statement carries the air of a small personal grudge from an ordeal that nearly broke him: "In the two years after making that record, I had to take on any client I could just to get by. All the smaller bands I'd previously worked with were now terrified of my involvement with a name as big as Nirvana, and all the bigger bands were terrified of the political battle Geffen had waged against me. The day 'In Utero' hit number 1 on the Billboard charts, I had 50 cents left in my bank account."

Albini had always thought the Nirvana situation was less than enviable, but he was certain they had made a great record: "I was thrilled to be a part of it. I was proud to have worked with those people, I always respected them for everything they had to go through. 'In Utero' is now in everyone's home, and it's the record that truly expresses what Nirvana wanted to do."

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