Primavera Sound festival names stage after Steve Albini

American sound engineer and musician Steve Albini, who recently passed away earlier this month, will have a stage named after him at the Primavera Sound festival.

The producer was renowned for his work with major bands such as Nirvana (producing In Utero), The Pixies and PJ Harvey. The musician also worked with some smaller Irish acts like Flogging Molly and New Secret Weapon.

Albini along with Shellac have appeared annually at the festival since 2008 including Primavera’s satellite festivals (Madrid, Porto).

The band has played at every festival since then for 15 years and was set to gig at Primavera 2024 before the frontman's unexpected death at 61 on May 7 of this year, just weeks before Primavera Sound is set to kick off.

The festival sets to honour and immortalise Albini’s historic legacy at the festival by naming the stage that Shellac was set to perform on after the musician.

The stage will be positioned across from the Plenitude Stage and will be permanently known as the Steve Albini Stage.

Shellac were meant to be the second band to perform on the stage, following Spanish punk band Viuda. Instead of finding a replacement, Primavera will hold a listening party to Shellac's new album To All Trains.

In response to the death of Albini, Primavera Sound released a tribute via social media. “We are gutted to learn about Steve Albini's death at 61. We have lost a legend, a friend, a member of our family. What are we going to do without you, Steve?”

Estamos sin palabras. Nos ha dejado Steve Albini a los 61 años. Hemos perdido a una leyenda de la música, pero sobre todo a un amigo. A un miembro de nuestra familia. ¿Y ahora qué vamos a hacer sin ti, Steve?

Después de actuar en 15 ediciones del festival, se nos hace muy… pic.twitter.com/brT0Cwv3sH

— Primavera Sound (@Primavera_Sound) May 8, 2024

Other bands that will play at the Steve Albini Stage include Duster, Scowl, Gel, Hannah Diamond, and Brutus.