My Bloody Valentine, 25 May. Eindhoven, de Effenaar

What can I say? Id been wanting to see MBV play live since forever, and was thrilled to learn they were doing shows again last year, but then immediately bummed to find they werent taking them out of the U.K. and that all the gigs there had been sold out in an instant. Id all but given up on ever seeing them perform at all when, wellimagine my skyrocketing serotonin levels when but about weeks ago word got out theyd be doing a one off show in the Netherlands. Hurrah! I owe you for bringing this one to my attention, Remco.

Before the show, we were hanging out around the corner of the venue, when a cab pulled up, out of which emerged none other than mister Kevin Shields himself. Too star struck to whip out the camera then and there, my friend YHAVR did manage to shoot some short clips during the show, and they give a good impression of what it was like.

To be honest, it still doesnt altogether compute that its finally gone down, but it was amaaaaazing, Ill tell you that much. Quite literally breathtaking. The holocaust section in You Made Me Realize was hallucinatory, primordial, blistering, mesmerizing; the closest Ive come to a full on OBE transcendental experience as of late. It is LOUD and has to be experienced to be believed. Its a weird thing to feel your body buzzing like that, even though youre standing still yourself, and I guess not everyone enjoyed it like I did, cause there were more than a few people making a run for the exit at this time.

It was fun taking the last train back to Amsterdam with all the other shoegazing hipsters like walking into some alternate universe where everyone has impeccable musical taste - and then, having made it home safely, tripping out on the crazy MBV-purple skies outside. Later that night, at the height of the storm, I found myself entertaining the possibility that Kevin Shields didnt really exit at all, but that he was the holographic avatar of a very popular syncretic religions main character who, having delivered everyone worthy of deliverance, had proceeded to pull the plug on our world. The lightning looked pretty apocalyptic, anyway.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• My
• Bloody
• Valentine
• live
• MBV
• Eindhoven
• de
• Effenaar