Banned from Metro Chicago

Part of Big Black’s local unpopularity stemmed from Albini and the vitriol he regularly directed at Chicago’s rock scene: by 1985, the Metro Chicago was the only club in the city that was booking punk rock shows and was also large enough to accommodate Big Black, but after performing there Albini badmouthed the club in an interview and found himself banned from it permanently. Compounding the problem were the band’s aggressive, noise-driven sound and Albini’s confrontational lyrics, which tested the tolerance of his white liberal audience by mercilessly satirizing racism , sexism , chauvinism , and stereotypes of homosexuality , sometimes using pejoratives like “darkie” and ” fag ” to drive home the point; this led some listeners to consider him a bigot .