Camp Revival

This past Monday night (4/27/09) I saw My Bloody Valentine here in Seattle. They toured the US last summer but missed Seattle as well as a number of other oft forgotten towns across the U.S., so they decided to do another tour this spring of all those spots that they missed last time around. I was so crushed this summer when I realized that I wouldn’t be able to see them, so I made sure to buy my tickets to this show the second the presale went up. I think in light of how overwhelming this show was it might be helpful to begin at the end, so I will start off with a few facts: it’s two days later, my head still hurts and my ears are still ringing. My expectations were unrealistically high and MBV destroyed them. It was easily one of the best shows I’ve ever seen.

I arrived at the show a bit late due to the 17 bus being slow. The highlight of my walk to the show was a massive hobo brawl near a bus stop due to the dropping of an N bomb. I guess it is irrelevant for the purposes of this show review, but it at least gives you a nice picture of local Seattle flavor. Pioneer Square is rough, man.

I walked into the show halfway through Brightblack Morning Light’s set. I thought they were pretty uninteresting, but they are probably the kind of band I will look back in ten years and kick myself for ignoring all those years ago. They played (from what I could tell) very ambient, atmospheric psych rock. Lots of reverb and delay going on there, muffled, faraway vocals, long hair, 60’s clothes, that sort of thing. My friend tells me they are much better on recording, they have a record on Matador so they must be doing something right. They tore down all their own gear, I liked that about them, up the punx. Then some singer songwriter type played. He mumbled his name once and I don’t really remember it. I really wonder how he ended up on this bill, pretty bizarre.

My Bloody Valentine came on stage to the synchronized flash of strobe lights. From the beginning it was apparent that the lights were just as much a part of the show as the music. The feeling I got the whole time was that of being totally overwhelmed. The lights, the huge production and crowd, the perfect melodies, seeing Belinda Butler in person ( I <3 Belinda ), Kevin Shields’ tremelo arm bending masterfully through a wall of amplifiers. It was all too much. I mean that in the best sense possible though, and I am confident that this is what I was supposed to feel, this sense of being subsumed under an experience, extraordinary in so many ways. It was really close to religious, and I don’t mean that in any goofy or sensational way. When they played their 20+ minute wall of sound finale I really felt as though I was about to go into a trance at any moment, I remember fighting hard to stay present throughout it. I won’t try to explain what this noise solo was like, instead here is a surprisingly good video of the first 8 minutes of it. The end of the world begins about two minutes in if you are impatient (thanks Johny Orient).

The video is a nice point of reference (notice how it is shaking the whole time, this is not due to the filmmakers Parkinson Disease, that is an unbelievable amount of air being pushed from lots and lots of speakers). Still, nothing can explain the feeling that 115-130 decibels has on you for that length of time. Your ribcage is rattling, your whole body shudders, your head aches, your balance is thrown off. I distinctly remember feeling that I was about to gag for a while, because of the way my throat was buzzing. Again, it is best summed up with that word: overwhelming.

I was pleasantly surprised at how RAW this band is. The set had so much energy, much more than I would have expected from the band that some say personify the shoegazer genre better than anyone else. I also was surprised at how many people were dancing to their “Glider” type dance tracks, I was certainly one of them. If you get the chance to see this band on future tours, don’t blow it. This should be a priority over pretty much anything you have going on in your life.

Here are some songs that I remember them playing, though it feels so much like a dream and I could be entirely wrong on one or two:

When You Sleep, Only Shallow, To Here Knows When, I Only Said, Soon, Slow, Cigarette in your bed, Thorn, You Made Me Realize, Lose My Breath, When You Wake (You’re Still In A Dream), Feed Me With Your Kiss

This short documentary is an in-depth look into the CT music scene. Either that or it is another slap-in-the-face by those Yo La Tengo jokers and their awesome new side project Condo Fucks.

Fuckbook is out via Matador 3/24.