1. Recording

2. Music and lyrics

3. Release and reception
     Accolades  

4. Packaging

5. Tour

6. Influence, covers and tributes

7. Track listing

8. Personnel

9. Charts
    Album 

10. References

11. Bibliography

In on the Kill Taker is the third full-length studio album by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi. It was released on June 30, 1993 through Dischord Records and was recorded at Inner Ear Studios and produced by Ted Niceley and Don Zientara. In on the Kill Taker captured the aggressiveness of the band's earlier releases while displaying a more diverse range of influences.

Due in part to the popularity of alternative rock in the early 1990s, In on the Kill Taker became the group's first album to debut on the Billboard charts and subsequently became the band's breakthrough album.^[2]

Recording

The band had originally recorded songs in Chicago with producer Steve Albini at Chicago Recording Company studios, with the intention of releasing a two or three song EP. However, the group ended up recording a whole album's worth of material, but were ultimately unhappy with the result and re-recorded the entire album in Washington D.C. at Inner Ear Studios with Don Zientara and Ted Niceley handling production duties. The original recordings from the Chicago sessions have since been bootlegged onto filesharing networks.^[3]

Despite the sessions in Chicago not entirely working out, it allowed the band to be well-prepared for what would become the album's proper recording sessions. According to singer/guitarist Guy Picciotto, “I think we really worked much harder on getting the songs together. We did a lot more pre-session demos, not just with Albini, but also using an 8-track reel-to-reel that we had bought to record our practices. It really changed the way we were able to work out the songs. It also helped us school ourselves a bit on how to engineer a basic recording.”^[4]

The album originally had the title In Pieces.^[5]

Music and lyrics

The material on In on the Kill Taker retained the band's aggressive and rhythmic style, but displayed more diversity as well. Fugazi downplayed any conscious efforts to make Kill Taker more experimental or diverse. According to Picciotto “I don’t really think of any of the records as being any more experimental than any of the others, because to us they were all experiments,” he said. “We were just trying to figure stuff out and push ourselves further each time. So to my ear every record sounds like a step forward, or sideways, or at least somewhere else from the one before it.”^[4]

The album's lyrics frequently reference films, in particular the song "Cassavetes" which is a tribute to actor/filmmaker John Cassavetes, as well as a critique of Hollywood culture. The song "Walken's Syndrome" references Woody Allen's film Annie Hall, where Christopher Walken's character feels an urge to crash into oncoming traffic at night.^[7]

Release and reception

The record garnered rave reviews from many publications including Spin, TIME magazine and Rolling Stone, with Rolling Stone writer Matt Diehl claiming that Fugazi is "the only band that matters."^[2] AllMusic critic Andy Kellman wrote: "It's probably Fugazi's least digestible record from front to back, but each track has its own attractive qualities, even if not immediately perceptible."^[6] Jonathan Gold of Los Angeles Times thought that on the album, "Fugazi works in more or less the same meta-pop ballpark as Sonic Youth," and further stated: "Fugazi hasn't a whimsical bone in its collective body, and the lyrics dance around the gloomiest topics in oblique college-poetry metaphor."^[7]

Accolades

Packaging

Filmmaker Jem Cohen, a long-time friend and collaborator of the band, was responsible for some of the album's art design and packaging. Found pieces of text and photographs were used to make up the overall layout. The cover image, showing a burned-out gold Polaroid of the Washington Monument, was found by Cohen in the street. The inner sleeve was a piece that Jeremy Blake,^[16] a friend of the band, found tacked to a light post in Chicago. The text on the cover side margin and back cover were also found on the ground in New York City by Cohen and contained the phrase "...so I could have tried to put a stop to the hater, the adversary workers, iniquity evildoers. This is big because people in high places are in on the kill taker".^[4]

Tour

By the time the In on the Kill Taker tour was underway, the group began to sell-out large auditoriums and arenas, as well as receive more lucrative major label offers. During the band's sold-out 3-night stint at New York City's Roseland Ballroom in September 1993, music mogul and Atlantic Records president Ahmet Ertegün met with the band backstage in an attempt to sign them. Ertegün offered the band "anything you want," their own subsidiary label and more than $10 million just to sign with Atlantic. Fugazi declined the offer.^[17] The organizers of Lollapalooza also attempted to recruit the band for a headlining slot on its 1993 tour, which the band considered but ultimately turned down.^[18]

Influence, covers and tributes

"Public Witness Program" has been covered by Screw 32.^[19] It is also the name of a band from Norway.^[20] The band Cassavetes took its name from the song of the same name on this album^[21], as did the band Great Cop.^[22] Plunderphonics musician Chris Lawhorn used 11 tracks from this album for his album Fugazi Edits.^[23][24] Greg Saunier and André de Ridder along with Stargaze "re-composed" the album in its entirety under the title Instruments, which is to be released on Record Store Day 2019.^[25][26]

Track listing

All songs by Guy Picciotto, Ian MacKaye, Joe Lally, and Brendan Canty.

Personnel

• Ian Mackaye - vocals, guitar
• Guy Picciotto - vocals, guitar
• Joe Lally - bass
• Brendan Canty - drums

• Ted Niceley and Fugazi – production
• Don Zientara – engineering
• Chad Clark – 2004 remastering
• Jem Cohen – graphic concept, assemblage
• Jason Farrell – cover mechanic
• Cynthia Connolly – carry out photo
• The Spectra System – band photo
• Jem Cohen, Jeremy Blake – texts

Charts

Album

References

Bibliography

• {{cite book |last=Freidman |first=Glen E. |title=Keep Your Eyes Open |publisher=Burning Flags Press |location=New York |year=2007 |isbn=0-9641916-8-7 |ref=harv}}
• {{cite book |last1=Gross |first1=Joe |title=In on the Kill Taker |date=2018 |publisher=Bloomsbury Academic |location=New York/London |isbn=978-1-5013-2139-9}}
• {{cite news|last=Norman|first=Tony|title=The band that won't sell out: Fugazi still plays by its own rules|newspaper=Pittsburgh Post-Gazette|year=1993|ref=harv}}
• {{cite book |chapter=Fugazi |last=Wolk |first=Douglas |authorlink=Douglas Wolk |editor1-last=Brackett |editor1-first=Nathan |editor2-last=Hoard |editor2-first=Christian |title=The New Rolling Stone Album Guide |publisher=Simon & Schuster |edition=4th |location=New York |year=2004 |isbn=0-7432-0169-8 |ref=harv}}

• Mialitiana Clerc
• Miallo, Queensland
• Mia Locks
• MIA LRT Station
• Mi amada Beatriz
• Mia Maid
• Mia Makaroff
• Mia Manganello
• Mia Massini
• Mia Matthes
• Mia Mašić
• Mia McKenna Bruce
• Miami 4-3 defense
• Miami (airport)
• Miami Airport station
• Miami Airport station (Amtrak)
• Miami Airport station (Florida)
• Miami Airport station (Metrorail)
• Miami Airport station (Tri-Rail)
• Miami (Alexandra Stan song)
• Mia Mia, Queensland
• Miami, Ariz.
• Miami Auto Museum
• Miami Auto Museum at the Dezer Collection
• Miami Avenue (Metromover station)