The One Where I Talk About Loveless
I want to talk to you about one of my favorite albums of all time.
When I was a kid, I thought I only liked instrumental music. This wasn’t actually true, I didn’t really know the kind of music I did like because I’d never paid attention to hear it before. I didn’t even know music could be about… things. I don’t really know what it was, but throughout elementary school, I didn’t know vocalists were saying words. At least in terms of actual sentences and constructed thoughts and ideas.
I didn’t know what the hell Jump Around by House of Pain was about, I just knew you danced to it. I, to this day, don’t know what in the world a “Mr. Saxobeat” is supposed to be. I suppose I had somewhat of a clue to the grander purpose of music, 3 year old me was bawling my eyes out to Apologize by OneRepublic which I still believe to be an amazing song. Otherwise, my exposure to music was through the muted, muffled speakers in supermarkets and the gaudy Christian rock stations my mom would play as she drove me to school.
If I could describe the album Loveless by My Bloody Valentine, it would be as though the idea of music I had as a 6-10 year old boy became a reality. Where the vocals were there, and they had a meaning if you looked for it, but it didn’t really matter either way. They were simply an instrument in some gigantic cacophony. A swarming sea of guitars and synthesizers with the exactly right amount of 90s flair.
My Bloody Valentine was by all accounts a relatively niche band in the late 80s and early 90s, its name even exuding the idea of “generic slightly edgy rock band”. Loveless in and of itself is an album name that gives the vibe of a not very deep sentiment typical of alternatives in their 20s.
It’s got that quintessential, straight out of a young adult novel type backstory too. A perfectionist lead guitarist bankrupting himself and his band’s label to fulfill his artistic vision while having a falling out with his girlfriend who happens to be the lead female vocalist. All the while constantly telling studio engineers to back off while they tell the band that they’re “doing it all wrong”. Details are cloudy, but one thing is clear, being that Kevin Shields (lead guitarist and vocalist) put all the energy he could into it.
The end result is an album that basically becomes the genesis of a genre known as "shoegaze”, an ironic jab at how those performing the music live stand still looking down towards their feet. A genre that even after 30 years, the general consensus is that Loveless remains the pinnacle of it.
Loveless was not necessarily a commercially successful album, never charting worldwide and only having a brief stint towards the bottom of the charts in the UK. Yet, Pitchfork lists it as the best album of the entire 1990s, ahead of juggernauts such as Nevermind or OK Computer. It’s gone on to inspire artists such as The Smashing Pumpkins, American Football, and Beach House (All you really need to name a band is an adjective and a noun, apparently). Not to mention the bands that exist inspired to recreate that same soundscape they created.
Loveless is unique in that it sounds practically broken, as though something’s wrong with whatever audio device you’re listening to it with. It’s all hazy. Everything sounds too quiet and too loud at the same time. Even in the middle of the very first track, the lead guitar slowly desyncs from the backing track to make you wonder if you’re hearing things correctly. Not to say that it’s entirely avant-garde, the album is littered with infectious rock melodies the likes of which may have fit well alongside the best work of U2 or Nirvana, but it can be difficult to hear them on your first listen due to everything that’s happening.
I mean, I have to say that there’s good reason the album cover is a distorted, blurry picture of an electric guitar. That’s pretty much exactly what you’re getting.
I don’t know much about music on the technical end, so my explanation isn’t going to do the work its full justice. However, I’ll give you my best attempt. Shields coined this technique he called the “glide guitar”, where he’d mess with the tremolo bar on his guitar as he strummed. It’s no surprise their two EPs before the release of the album were called Glider and Tremelo respectively. By bending his guitar in and out of tune, his one guitar could sound like way more than just one guitar. Take those sounds, and then rigorously sample them, Shields said he could “make any instrument he wanted”.
My favorite quality in any form of media is being able to be fully immersed in it. It’s a rarely experienced feeling for me, a height reached and cherished on rare occasion. Whether it be games, movies, books, anything that grabs my full attention throughout its duration. Every time I see the movie Everything Everywhere All At Once I am glued to my seat for all two and a half hours of its runtime. Remembering the frigid winter night I read Kentaro Miura’s graphic novel Berserk enveloped in the darkness is a special memory of my sophomore year of college. Secret Base’s exceptional seven-part retelling of the history of the Minnesota Vikings by Jon Bois and Alex Rubenstein that had me itching for every hour long episode as they came out weekly.
In terms of music, the songs Sea of Voices and Wind Tempos from Porter Robinson or the best cuts on the Bon Iver project For Emma, Forever Ago come to mind. Fleeting, minutes long segments where an artist got it just right. However, an album is an opportunity to form a sonic universe. An ability of which only Kid A by Radiohead can even rival Loveless in being, and even then, I think Loveless is outright better at it. It’s such a unique, powerful, ethereal experience. No other album can I close my eyes and truly feel like I’m somewhere other than my bedroom.
Every time I pick the album back up after some time of having not listened to it, I find new things I’m amazed with. Only Shallow is one of my favorite songs of all time, with its commanding punk rock inspired melody and thumping snare drum bursting within the very first seconds. When You Sleep is close behind it with its dozen vocal layers guiding you along a dream pop banger. The playful synth on Soon making it seem as though the song will never end. The enveloping, repetitive guitars on Loomer and What You Want building an atmosphere that To Here Knows When takes full advantage of, sounding like what I can only describe as the plane between consciousness and unconsciousness. The wailing lead on Come in Alone that I seem to forget just how fantastic it is every time until it comes on. The rumbling drones of the balladic Sometimes as Shields wishes an unnamed lover could understand him.
I’ve named almost every song on the album at a moment where I’m merely trying to touch on highlights. And like, it’s an acquired taste. I get it, but I acquired that taste and it is delicious. The only track I even consider skippable is a minute long interlude, the rest in some way or another, in one mood or another, offer something unmatched for me.
Why does what I think/feel/have to say matter?
Well, it doesn’t. You have no reason to take my word on any of what I’ve said here. By no means am I an authority on music, I’m just some dork who likes some album that’s nearly 15 years his senior.
However, I do really like music. In a sense, I wish I wrote about it more, but rarely are there times more substantive than “It sounds good in my ears and/or I think it has an important message I don’t have enough of a connection to the source material for me to speak on it deeply”. There’s a reason this post is quite short even for one of my absolute favorites (and honestly should be quite the testament to how much I love Porter Robinson’s Nurture to have written this behemoth about it).
Perhaps I’ll write more about more music another time. Perhaps I won’t. Either way, I hope you got a little something out of this. Thanks for reading.