scene but not herd

When I was a kid I loved horror movies. I still like them, but back then I devoured any information about them that I could get my hands on. One magazine that I bought religiously was Fangoria. I think I bought every issue except one from 1979 until 1992 or 1993. At some point in the early eighties they started printing gatefold posters on the inside of the covers. One of the posters was for a movie called MY BLOODY VALENTINE. Years later that name would have relevance in my life once again in the form of a band.

The first thing I ever bought by the band was the Sunny Sundae Smile single in 1987. It's a great single; sugary, fuzzed-out pop music. Oddly enough, having liked the single quite a bit, I didn't bother buying any subsequent releases.

In 1988 I met one of my best friends, Tita. She was dating a friend of mine and he told me that she liked the same kind of music as me. Boy, did she like the same music as I did. At the time it was amazing to find someone who shared my taste in music. Needless to say we became fast friends. She made me a great mix tape with stuff like the Wedding Present, BMX Bandits, McCarthy, the Flatmates, and Biff Bang Pow on it. One of the songs on it was "I Don't Need You" from My Bloody Valentine's Ecstasy album. I loved this song and it made me regret not buying their records after that first single. Around this same time the band was getting a lot of press in the English music papers over the two EP's they had put out, Feed Me With Your Kiss and You Made Me Realize, and I finally decided I needed to listen to them again. I bought those EP's and the Isn't Anything album and it took me awhile to warm up to this new sound. I was used to that jangly, fuzzed-out pop sound that they had and suddenly here was something different. This new sound had some remnants from the past, but it was noisier, aggresive, experimental, and sensual. Eventually I really warmed up to it. The song "Slow" from that time period has to be one of the sexiest songs ever.

In 1989 I found out that the band would be playing Bogart's in Long Beach and Club Lingerie in Hollywood. My friends Tita, Nancy, and Jessica got a head start on me by travelling up to the Bay area and seeing a few shows. They also had an opportunity to meet the band and schedule a fanzine interview at their Long Beach show. I met the girls on the afternoon of June 16th in front of Bogart's and the band soon pulled up in their van. I was then introduced to the band and I think Kevin's sister and brother were there as well as a tour manager. They were all very nice to us. We got to see them sound check and the band signed the aforementioned Fangoria poster which is the picture you see posted above. We all then went to a nearby coffee place and we interviewed them for my friends' fanzine called Over the Wall. My friends weren't 21 yet so they had to miss the show, but we invited the band to Disneyland the next day. Thankfully I was 21 and I was able to see a great show. They played stuff from the EP's and Isn't Anything and they surprised me by encoring with a song from the Sunny Sundae Smile single and Lovlee Sweet Darlene from The New Record By My Bloody Valentine single.

The next day everyone went to Disneyland except Kevin. He spent the day at the Guitar Center store on Sunset Blvd. They were staying at a motel roughly across the street from there. The rest of us spent most of the day at Disneyland and had a great time. We all went home then to recuperate a little before we headed to Hollywood to see them play at Club Lingerie. The band put us on the guest list and Colm personally escorted the girls in so they wouldn't be carded. Once again it was a great show. Afterwards I was able to help them load up their van and we all went back to their motel and hung out in their room. They were so nice to us. I wish I could remember what we talked about, but my memory fails me. I think we were there until five in the morning. As we drove home with the sun coming up we were all so excited that we were able to hang out with one of our favorite bands.

The reason I'm even writing any of this is because I found out that someone is writing a book about the making of Loveless. The author posted a message at a My Bloody Valentine site asking people to send him messages of how Loveless provided an epiphany to them. I thought of e-mailing him the following story, but I'm not really sure that it is relevant to his book.

It seemed like an eternity between Isn't Anything and the Glider EP that followed, but it was well worth the wait. "Soon" was just an amazing song. It was the perfect mix of dance beats, and swooning guitars and vocals. Eventually Loveless came out and I was lucky to get a promo cassette months ahead of the release date. My friend Tita was studying in England at the time and I sent her a copy of the cassette a few weeks before it was released there. She sent me a letter in which she wrote the following dated November 19, 1991.


"Okay, the weekend after I got your tape, I went to Edinburgh again (where I saw Chaperhouse again, this time with the Belltower). When I showed my friend Andrew the tape, he nearly had a heart attack. It was so cute! So he listened to the first track and we took off for the the Edinburgh Uni student union where an indie disco was taking place. He stormed into the DJ booth and showed the DJ, Jem, the cassette, who then proceeded to go into similar hysterics as Andrew! So they cued up the first track and Andrew comes out over the microphone: 'This is a track off the new My Bloody Valentine LP which hasn't even been released yet, so this is sort of a world exclusive.' The kids went wild! Dancing and loving it. Afterwards everyone kept coming up to Andrew- 'How did you get that???' It was so great! Only in Britain could this happen."


It really doesn't describe an epiphany per se, but it does show the very real excitement we had in first hearing it. I saw the band three more times and was even able to hang out with them one more time at a much nicer hotel, the Hyatt on Sunset. As I stated earlier it seemed like an eternity between the release of Isn't Anything and Loveless, but it was nothing compared to the realization that another album would not come after Loveless. I don't really know what the future holds for My Bloody Valentine, but it was a great time while it lasted.