Big Black and the ability to let things go

A while ago a friend gave me a book called Our Band Could Be Your Life by Michael Azerrad. It tells the story of several punk bands from the 80s that influenced the punk/hardcore/noise rock scenes. I have slowly been making my through it as well as listening to the bands in the process. Bands like Minor Threat and Black Flag aren't new to me but there was one band that I wanted to know more about. Big Black first crossed my radar when Steve Albini died in 2024 but I never got round to listening to them. In fact when Albini passed it didn't really impact me as I didn't really know anything about the guy other than he was some kinda punk old head. He was clearly very influential but somehow not much about him had really crossed my radar in all my time listening to punk. So who was this dude anyway. Well you can't really judge a person by reading one chapter that broadly outlines one creative project of theirs. The Big Black chapter definitely answered some questions and confirmed some…