My Bloody Valentine

Patrick bought tickets months ago to the My Bloody Valentine
concert in Los Angeles that occured October 1 and 2. I will admit that although I had heard a couple of their songs on KCRW 98.9FM National Public Radio in Los Angeles and on late night Big Sonic Chill on 94.9FM here in San Diego - I had never really followed them.

No longer. Once I knew I was going to this concert with the band that has a great punk-sounding name and has been on P's Myspace for a year or so - I began to research them and bought their last 2 cds.

Turns out they are now definitely one of my favorites in my huge, eclectic taste of music - ranging from opera to punk. A little background - they are a Dublin band that formed in 1984 with 2 Irish gents and 2 British gals. Their heyday was the early 90s when they became known as one of the original 'shoegazing' genre - speaks for itself..

The band disbanded for about 10 years and then reunited last year with the announcement of a small North American tour - of course we were going to go see them - even driving to smelly LA - was worth it as the fact that they reunited after so long prompted fans coming out of the woodwork with lamentations posted on their myspace page akin to, "I wish you were coming to Vegas (Connecticut, Des Moines, etc), I've waited my whole life to see you.."What made this concert extremely interesting and memorable for me as we listened, captivated, by the sound display was just that: the sound. These are musicians, creators, artist and writers. They are NOT performers. Think about what I am saying. Anyone with a recording label contract nowadays (especially in the USA), are prepped, pimped and made-over to be extremely photogenicperformers- - Even if they only churn out one #1 hit and a heavily-played video on MTV and VH1. Don't get me wrong - I can appreciate a really good performer, and usually most lead vocalists of a band have the ego and hunger for it. But this show, at the Santa Monica Civic Theater, was unlike anything I'd seen before.

I had even remarked to P on our drive up about how interested I was in seeing what they pull off, because they are a recording studio artist band - their "sound" consists of multi-layered guitars, warped, dreamlike synthesizer chords all bent-pitches and distorted. How on earth were they going to pull that off in a live concert?? Well, I will admit that listening to them live doesn't do their music justice. And the band knows it, from some of the quotes we've heard them say on tour. They evidently hate going on tour because they know that their recording sound is almost impossible to reproduce live.

That said, it was amazing and otherworldly-like. I'd never gone to a 'shoegazing' band before - they literally stare down the whole time at the floor, barely acknowledge each other much less the audience. They are not showy or performers, talkative or selling their personality, good looks, dance skills, or even their singing skills - as they treat the vocal line secondary to the music. Even on the cds it is very difficult to pick out the words they are singing about - pity, because they are poetic and moody (just how I like them) but you would need to really follow along with the printed lyrics to make them out.

The vocals are switched back and forth or sometimes dueted by Kevin Shields and Bilinda Butcher (evidently an item for some time who broke up DURING the recording of the appropriately named last album in 1992, "Loveless" --- ahh nothing like your heart completely trashed to bring out the best in an artist of any genre - sigh :P ).

Back to the concert, the light show was amazing, blinding, again - it wasn't about putting spotlights on the 4 members - they wanted to be incognito, hidden behind the sound of music they created. Most artists are such ego maniacs that it was amazing to see the band literally shrouded in dark, moody lighting with heads turned down.

Another notable concert fact is that this band evidently broke the Guinness Book of World Records for 'Loudest Band' live. Amazing, because although they really rock on some of their songs, they all tend to be moody and dreamlike. You'd think a screaming heavy metal band would win top honors, but what it is, is that MBV uses a lot of reverberated, crunch chords with the warped tones that swing momentarily out of pitch - creating an amazing dreamlike, spiritual and ethereal sound that you can physically feel resonate on inside on on your persona.

They are loud because you actually FEEL their music and the dissonance created at times made our hair stand up on our arms - I am not kidding! The last 22 minutes (yes - 22!!) of the concert was a "Wall of Sound" - they essentially just played 'white noise' - toneless and full of vibrations so loudly that they actually pass out earplugs (a concert staple for me in any case) at the door because they can really mess up one's hearing doing that. It went on so long that I honestly felt like I was 'tripping' out over the music and going to a different place. (There were some puffs of marijuana clouds coming from the alternative crowd - so I KNOW some people were literally: tripping.)

Patrick held onto me from behind - we were standing about 10 rows back - and it was as if we were traveling to another dimension. I cannot do it justice - cannot put words to it - it was something one cannot imagine unless being there.No encore, no other songs - just that last Wall of Sound. Those who thought they were too cool, and didn't wear their earplugs were witnessed leaving painfully holding their ears and looking miserable. But if you could stand it - it was well worth it. I will most likely never experience a concert like this again in my life.

Ahh yet another pretty unqiue and memorable experience to share with my own 'bloody valentine', eh ??? :P