MBV: Everything and More

I had the extreme pleasure to see My Bloody Valentine live for the first time last night. If I ever needed to validate their slot as my favorite band ever, I got every bit of proof necessary.


Being a nerd about MBV, I went down with fellow nerd Phil Pickens (www.thecolorawesome.com) at around 3 in the afternoon. Phil had the good fortune to run into Deb Googe on Sunday afternoon and had a drink with her at 6 Arms. Since he's got excellent band meeting karma, I was happy to follow him to the venue early for a chance to rub elbows with these magical people. Sadly, our early arrival yielded no meetings, unless you count a stuttering bartender at a sport's bar and a group of cute kids humming the oh so familiar bendy "flute" melody from "I Only Said."

Sufficiently tipsy, Phil and I (who were now joined by our friends Xin Wong and Scott Kennedy) wandered into WAMU Theater and quickly bought t-shirts and buttons. We were given earplugs with a kind "warning" about the band's levels while we entered the show room, which was nowhere near full at this time. While more and more people came in, Phil and I began to get more and more giddy about the show. As we had assumed, we knew a large portion of the early crowd, and more friends and like minded music nerds filed in continuously until Kurt Heasley's AMAZINGLY BEAUTIFUL acoustic set (really an unexpected highlight for me.)

Quick side note: Phil and I yelled out "Won't Make You Sleepy" (our favorite Lily's tune) after Kurt's second song, to which he replied "That's a good idea!" but when he began to play it, he broke a string and went back to "Plan A".

Kurt was done, everyone was excited, earplugs were in. My favorite four musicians wander on stage and began blowing me away from the first chords of, believe it or not, "I Only Said." Phil and I quickly realized that the earplugs weren't really necessary at that time. I thought to myself "They must say this for people who aren't in bands." But two songs in, I had to reinsert the earplugs which made the songs come more into focus, oddly enough. I did alternate throughout the set, one song without plugs, one with, but decided during "Soon" that it would just be a better idea for me to keep them in. In several small fits of joy, I would hug Phil or Brian (my baby) and pogo like an idiot to "Thorn" or "When You Sleep", while other times we would just marvel at the spot on performances of "Cigarette in Your Bed" and "To Here Knows When".

You'll read a million posts about last night's "You Made Me Realise" so I'll just add a quick note about my experience during the 18 minute maelstrom in the middle of that 3 minute song. It begins and even with my earplugs in I began to have aches in my eardrums. Then, slowly but surely, my chest began to vibrate. The more violent low end got, the more my chest shook. I looked around at the 50 people I could see around me, all of whom were clutching their chests or jamming their fingers in their ears. Then my nose started to tickle, which seemed odd to me. I noticed that when my nose tickled, it was almost impossible to breathe through it. Were my nostrils flapping open and shut??? If I lifted one leg off the ground, I would feel the sole of my shoe vibrating. My skin tingled all over and I started feeling slightly euphoric. Not an unfamiliar sensation, or an unpleasant one, I have to say.

Walking out of the venue (which proved to be difficult) the crowd communed in this shared experience and you could hear a chorus of "WOW"s and "FUCK"s. Everyone I stood with agreed that it was the most satisfying show we could have hoped for. Every expectation of mine was met and exceeded. My favorite band is still my favorite band.

After that, we headed to Bus Stop for "My Bloody Afterparty" where Phil and I played music for a bar full of awesome people, most of whom were at the show. A perfect ending to a perfect day.