Now Loveless is possibly one of the least penetrable records on this list, and especially in the top 10 on this list. It's a record that takes patience and some effort from the listener. It's a record that isn't as easily penetrable as perhaps OK Computer, Abbey Road or In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, but that doesn't take away from the quality of the record.
I first came across My Bloody Valentine's music through Sofia Coppola's Lost In Translation and I quickly became interested in their other releases. There was something about the atmosphere and lush feeling of a track like Sometimes that made me crave more. How this wall of sound, built with brick on brick of guitar distortion, thick as mud sitting in the back of your ears as lush, dreamy vocals take the forefront and lead you into a passage of harmony and bliss.
For me this was some incredibly unique, something original which I hadn't previously heard. The influences of brit-rock, alt-rock and other similar rock-oriented genres that were popular in England during the time (early 90's) were obvious of course but it was the general feel and the general interpretation of the music which was done and executed in a way that I personally had never seen before. And even back then, in 1991, it was something unique even if the idea of shoegaze, rock music with an affinity for pedals and experimentation, had been around for a couple years prior.
I discussed shoegaze in general with two friends a couple nights ago. We were talking about an upcoming festival and recommending a friend to get acquainted with, and then of course to view, the band Slowdive who was performing. My friend described the genre of shoegaze to the other friend as "heroin pop" and it was a word that truly stuck with me. Because this is pretty much how My Bloody Valentine's music feels. Like drifting away, without a care in the world when your in a mood that begs you to just lie down and take in different nuances that exist all around you.
It's a blissful genre and it's blissful music. I want to call Loveless beautiful but the word isn't quite fitting since it's not beauty that is at play, it's the collision of brutish guitar distortion, just a quick step away from noise rock blended with somber dream pop, lush and warm, to create some kind of middle road.
It's been over 30 years since Loveless, the most influential and praised of the many shoegaze records of the time (Ride's Nowhere, Slowdive's Souvlaki, The Jesus & Mary Chain's Psychocandy) and to this day noone has quite succeeded in creating something in the same genre that surpasses it. Even to this day, when shoegaze has become almost the new "indie", the trendy genre that the difficult high school kids love, we see tons of look-alikes and bands who attempt to create something similar but just end up sounding like rip-offs.
My personal relationship with Loveless has been a complicated one. I love the beauty of tracks like Sometimes and To Here Knows When but what competely turns me of all of it are the ridiculous melodies, the riffs that are supposed to be the center of many of the tracks on the album and the clash of beauty and harshness that rarely wins me over. Tracks like I Only Said and Come In Alone completely take me out of the atmosphere that the calmer, more focused tracks have taken the album into and I find that this ruins the cohesive feel of the record, making me opt to only return to the more dream pop-esque tracks instead of actually experiencing the album front to back.
Maybe it's all because of the thick skin surrounding Loveless, maybe it's something that I still haven't quite grown into and maybe I'll one day wake up and realize that Loveless is the woman I've loved all my life and it's about time that I seize the day and come to that realization.
Despite my personal qualms with the record I do think that it's one that's worth experiencing, much like The Dark Side Of The Moon and OK Computer. Loveless might not be the most mainstream on the list but it's an album who's influence might be more important today than it has been during these past two decades since its release.
Loveless
My Bloody Valentine
7/10
Anton Öberg Sysojev
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