The all things 'Fugazi' thread.

[washing machine]

more live shows added to Apple Music

listened to most of the '99 Seattle show today

a lot of End Hits

love it

Now that there is a sizable collection and counting, I'm starting to binge.

Listened to a '95 show recently with a fantastic set, but the audio quality sucked. I switched to that Seattle 99 one you referenced.

Curious, can you breakdown some defining flavor of the different tours?

[96583UP]

i’ve listened to 4-5 of these so far

the setlists roughly follow the album progressions

that said the later era still contain great renditions of early album songs

in general the recording quality improves in the later era (no surprise)

i personally feel like this is a band that got better over time, and when they went on hiatus, were at their peak

obviously many can rebut, this is a personal view

but i love the whole catalogue

the later era has the fully monty of what my body needs

like vitamins

and plenty of add-on jams and things

that said, we will see what else gets released!

i love it all so it’s all gravy

[washing machine]

I know we've discussed this before, but that Reclamation intro is so good.

[96583UP]

oh yes

my appreciation for Glue Man has grown since the release of these

i mean i always loved it

but you hear it here as a closer

with such intensity

[washing machine]

Yep. Let's talk about Closed Captioned too. Guy's (is that Guy or Ian? I guess Guy) are always super loose and prickly, like they're barely going to make it through the verses. Somehow it works and I love it.

[96583UP]

one of my favorite songs, from any band, ever

special place in my heart

[washing machine]

I went back to that 95 show that I paused because of the low audio quality.

It's really f****** good. Just the sheer intensity makes up for the muffled sound. Smallpox Champion and Shut the Door specifically.

[96583UP]

I went back to that 95 show that I paused because of the low audio quality.

It's really f****** good. Just the sheer intensity makes up for the muffled sound. Smallpox Champion and Shut the Door specifically.

nice will check that out

once long ago i scrawled several lines of the lyrics to shut the door in giant letters on the wall of my apartment

i had drank quite a lot that evening

[96583UP]

already in the albini thread but belongs here as well

https://fugazi.bandcamp.com/album/albin ... rs-charity

In the fall of 1992, the members of Fugazi were deep in the process of finishing up the songs that would eventually come out as the “In On The Killtaker” album the following year. The band had been working on the songs for a couple of years and had gotten as far as recording a few of them at Inner Ear as well as making numerous practice recordings, but by late October they seemed to have hit a bit of a wall. In an attempt to shake things up, it was decided that they would take up Steve Albini’s standing invitation to do a free recording at his Electrical Audio Studio, which at the time was located in the basement of his house on North Francisco in Chicago.

Fugazi and Steve had crossed paths numerous times over the years and had become friends and admirers of each other’s work. The band really appreciated Steve’s aesthetic, especially the early Jesus Lizard records and it seemed like the change of scenery would help them get a better perspective on the songs they had written.

In early November, a minivan was rented, loaded up with gear, and driven to Chicago by Ian and Joe, while Brendan and Guy made the 12-hour drive in Brendan’s station wagon. They arrived at Steve’s house and immediately got to work. The original plan was to spend a weekend recording just two or three songs, but once everything was set up and the tape was rolling, they just kept on tracking.

The hang itself was epic and in the downtime, when they weren’t recording, a deeper affinity and friendship was quickly realized. Steve would show off his culinary skills making the group fresh pasta from scratch, after which they would all gather around his kitchen table to play Corickey, a dice game the band had taught him in London a couple of years before. This was a shared obsession and a constant feature of any time spent together. Steve would then traumatize the band with screenings from his collection of outré videos and they would spend hours talking about punk rock. The laughter was non-stop.

In those three or four days, 12 songs ended up getting recorded and mixed –the entirety of the eventual “In On The Killtaker” album. During playbacks in Steve’s upstairs mixing room everyone was very excited by the results. However, once the band was driving back home to DC with cassettes of the rough mixes to check out it was clear that this was a session that wasn’t going to be released. The two vehicles met at a rest stop in Ohio and there both sets of band members realized they had come to the same conclusion independent of each other. It’s difficult to explain the issue, but, for as incredible as things felt while at Electrical, the songs sounded flat in subsequent listens. A few days after returning home, Albini wrote to the band with a similar opinion and it was decided to nix the recording.

Less than a month later, Fugazi went into Inner Ear Studio with producer Ted Nicely to make what would become the official “In On The Killtaker” album which was released by Dischord in June 1993, while the so-called “Albini Session” was shelved. Though the Chicago recordings have been under lock and key for over three decades, some tapes have leaked out and poor-quality versions of some of the songs have ended up on the internet.

To honor Steve, who died in 2024, and to support the work that he and his wife, Heather Whinna, have done with the non-profit Letters Charity organization, Fugazi has decided to make Steve’s entire original mix officially available for the first time in transfers pulled directly from the master tapes.

This is a digital-only release and the band is donating its share of the proceeds to Letters Charity. Please be generous.

Thank you.

Letters Charity provides direct assistance to families facing urgent financial hardship.

Letters Charity is a nonprofit organization on a mission to use Art as a conduit to transform passive compassion into immediate assistance through the distribution of money given, without expectation or judgment, directly to families experiencing poverty.

Best place to learn more or support is letterscharity.org

———————————
Video Credits:
Matti Harju - Cinematographer
Miikka Anttonen - Producer
Jeff Hadick - Editor
credits
released March 6, 2026

Fugazi is:

Ian MacKaye - vocals & guitar
Guy Picciotto - vocals & guitar
Joe Lally - bass
Brendan Canty - drums

Recorded & Mixed by Steve Albini
at Electrical Audio, November 1992

Mastered by T.J. Lipple, 2025

[VinylGuy]

RIP Trag

Ill always remember you buddy

[VinylGuy]

I didnt actually remember that the band did something with Albini, kinda funny they had a great time but the recording turned to sound flat regarding to them

[96583UP]

listened to this earlier on my bike ride

so much to enjoy

a few thoughts off the top of my head

cassavetts - when the high pitched guitar part kicks in it really sears. better than the album version

public witness - hits really hard in this one

instrument - slightly different snare placement from brendan on this one. makes it a little more unglued

all the guy songs seem to hit pretty hard

i could see where parts they thought were flat but only because these guys bring so much adrenaline live

this prob helped them when they went into the studio for good to really refine

[washing machine]

Between this release, the live series, and new messthetics, these guys are currently in a new golden age it seems.

Grateful to hear albini's touch on Brendan's drums. Especially on returning the Screw he sounds great.

[96583UP]

yeah return the screw sounded so fking good

[96583UP]

newly posted to apple music: Oct 2002 live in Leeds, UK

sound quality is excellent

setlist is hot fire

opens with Ex-Spectator, so powerful

Reclamation track 3

Full Disclosure 4

how many bands retired at their peak

[96583UP]

Closed Captioned track 9

might be brought to tears

[96583UP]

holy shit Number 5 live

[96583UP]

Furniture (live)

could there be anything better

[VinylGuy]

Blasting End Hits right now...is this the perfect Fugazi album?

[washing machine]

I go back and forth with that and red medicine. Those were the two that helped me understand that this band has real range.