SteveAlbinisCloset.com<\/a>, refers to Albini\u2019s random bits and bobs.<\/p>\nAnyway, some months since the sale started, how\u2019s it going?<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a grind,\u201d Coley said, \u201cbut it\u2019s going well, we get 20 or 30 orders as soon as we begin every Friday, we get the people who spend a couple of thousand bucks right away, we get the people looking for test pressings of records Steve owned, the people who collect old T-shirts, and you get the people who want a beat up old paperback copy of (Robert Heinlein\u2019s) \u2018Stranger in a Strange Land\u2019 just because it was Steve\u2019s. That\u2019s what you call an \u2018association item,\u2019 an item not necessarily worth much by itself, but put it on a shelf and you have a story to tell \u2014 it\u2019s worth more to you.\u201d<\/p>\n
In short, an act of generosity for the estate of an old friend has become a 40- to 50-hour second job. Not that Coley is complaining \u2014 that\u2019s just the reality of estate sales, he said. You need to grade each item, you need to pack each item, you need to ship each item, be it a Fender guitar or a pair of Albini\u2019s socks. Coley takes a small percentage of the profits \u2014 he figures he makes roughly $20 an hour on it \u2014 and though sales slowed since he began in May, Steve Albini\u2019s Closet has pulled in around $100,000 so far. It\u2019s also devoured Coley\u2019s living room, which is stacked so high with artifacts, it\u2019s a museum of late-century underground culture, a peek at vintage Chicago hipsterdom.<\/p>\n
Testing pressings of records by Big Black, Albini\u2019s first band. A 1984 concert poster from the Cubby Bear. A copy of Time Out Chicago (with Albini on the cover, beside Roger Ebert and Chris Ware). A print from Evanston artist Jay Ryan. A DVD of \u201cHigh Fidelity.\u201d A Cheap Trick bootleg. A 2009 \u201cHonorary Employee\u201d plaque from Reckless Records. Records that Albini owned (Wire, Elvis Costello) as an undergraduate at Northwestern.<\/p>\n
![\"Posters](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/bird-nest-trio.jpg\")
Posters created by Steve Albini for a Metro show by the Louisville band\u00a0Squirrel Bait, and a concert he played in Boston with his band Big Black and the Meat Puppets (left and right); and an Albini sketch of indie artist Will Oldham, better known as Bonnie “Prince” Billy. (Provided by Byron Coley)<\/p>\n
To poke around his virtual closet is to realize there is a celebrity estate sale for every aesthetic. David Lynch\u2019s estate had one. Stephen Sondheim\u2019s estate sold his old puzzles. Philip Roth\u2019s sold his typewriters and baseball cards. The estates of Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher, mother and daughter, who died 24 hours apart, had a joint sale. Fitting her QVC history, Joan Rivers\u2019s estate sold her jewelry online. Coley has done this before, mainly for musicians. But technically, when the owner of the stuff is not dead, it\u2019s a tag sale, which is what he organized for Sonic Youth\u2019s Thurston Moore and Kim Gordon after their 2013 divorce; he sold off their gigantic art and record collections.<\/p>\n
You might also just call them elaborate yard sales.<\/p>\n
Albini and Coley had talked for years about selling Albini\u2019s stuff one day, while he was alive; they discussed it the day the producer died. They were friends. Coley, who is 69, already had a career in records and music journalism when Albini, as an undergraduate, would write to him about Coley\u2019s record reviews. \u201cActually, Steve would write reviews of my reviews,\u201d Coley said. \u201cLike \u2018That Meat Puppets review was great but that Husker Du review, that was pretty lousy.\u2019 I\u2019d think, who is this guy and how did he get my address?\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the items you will not find in Steve Albini\u2019s Closet are the two wedding presents that Albini gave Coley. \u201cSteve told me \u2018I\u2019m going to make you one thing, but then I\u2019m also going to buy you something expensive and stupid.\u2019 He was actually late to the wedding because the airline wouldn\u2019t let him on the plane with what he had.\u201d Albini built a huge grinding wheel that gave off showers of sparks. As for the stupid expensive gift: he gave the couple an original letter written by sci-fi writer Philip K. Dick.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/rema-trio.jpg\")
A poster for a concert in Logan Square hosted by Steve Albini’s band Shellac, a test pressing of the vinyl edition of the Chicago band Big Black’s “Rema-Rema” single, and a coffee mug received from comedian Marc Maron after Albini appeared on Maron’s podcast are among the items on Steve Albini’s Closet. (Provided by Byron Coley)<\/p>\n
Albini was never really a collector of memorabilia, Coley said, \u201cbut he also wasn\u2019t Marie Kato.\u201d He suspects Albini held onto piles of old zines and records and VHS tapes for more practical reasons, because he often hosted out-of-town bands, who crashed at Electrical Audio, his Avondale recording studio. \u201cI think Steve saved some of this for the guests to read and watch. A lot of bands he invited, they didn\u2019t have money for a hotel, they didn\u2019t have money to do a lot in Chicago. He never charged much for his services.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s also why \u2014 despite many requests from visitors to Steve Albini\u2019s Closet \u2014 Coley doesn\u2019t have old record contracts to sell: Albini refused to ask clients to sign contracts.<\/p>\n
Indeed, years later, some of the shoppers on Steve Albini\u2019s Closet are the sons and daughters of the late members of bands that Albini recorded, hoping for an artifact of a bygone session. Some \u2014 like Fred Armisen<\/a>, who\u2019s bought a few records \u2014 were friends.<\/p>\nBut most are fans, collectors, admirers.<\/p>\n
Coley posts between 100 and 200 new objects each week. Still to come: an original painting by Iggy Pop; gold records by Nirvana and the Pixies: a Grammy owned by PJ Harvey; World Series of Poker bracelets ( Albini took home the poker equivalent of a Grammy twice); many books on the history of Chicago baseball; and several posters Albini created for his own bands, likely while working by day at a Chicago ad agency.<\/p>\n
At first, Coley thought selling all of Albini\u2019s stuff would take maybe six months.<\/p>\n
Now he hopes to be finished by May 2026. \u201cIt\u2019s like having a kid. You say it won\u2019t take all of your time, and you\u2019ll still be able to live your life. But then, in for a penny, in for a pound.\u201d<\/p>\n
cborrelli@chicagotribune.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who needs an old Brookfield Zoo T-shirt (L) depicting a white wolf? How about a used prescription bottle…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":410896,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5124],"tags":[960,171,5386,1818,1370,5424,1072],"class_list":{"0":"post-410895","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago","8":"tag-chicago","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-il","11":"tag-illinois","12":"tag-latest-headlines","13":"tag-music-and-concerts","14":"tag-things-to-do"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115628182483422281","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410895","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410895"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410895\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}