“Mani used to like this song,” says Kevin Shields, before the jet engine roar of ‘Soon’ comes whirring to life and envelops the room with a blast radius that feels like it could shatter windows for miles. The deep throbbing pulse of the song moves in waves, almost inducing the feeling of sea sickness, such is the power of the motions that thrash like a raging ocean. Then there’s a sudden silence as the power cuts out. “It must be Mani fucking about,” laughs Deborah Googe. When the problem gets fixed, they play the song again and it somehow sounds even more intense and mighty, as they double down on paying tribute to the late bass player who was also Shields’ old bandmate during their stint in Primal Scream together.
There’s something of a symbiotic relationship between Mani and My Bloody Valentine that feels poignantly inescapable tonight. Both are synonymous with pioneering, generation-defining indie rock, and both have applied a level of weight, density and punch to music that is capable of transforming the sound of a band. Those who saw Primal Scream live during their XTRMNTR era, in which Mani was on bass and Shields was on guitar, speak about it with a giddy reverence of a band operating at the full throttle peak at its apex.
XTRMNTR, and also Vanishing Point, would be very different records without Mani’s input. From the opening ‘Kill All Hippies’ on the former, it is his driving, heavy, corkscrewing basslines that dominate that track and set forth the fiery charge of the band’s most aggressive, noisy, album. Shields is a man of very few words, but making a point of paying tribute to Mani also feels symbolic from a band who are equally skilled in gliding from nimble, deft, melody-heavy moments, to music that is so intense and heavy that you feel the need to check if all your teeth are still in place.
It seems mildly silly to say this now, given that MBV are a band famous for bowel-evacuating volume and creating a section of music so distressing it’s nicknamed “the holocaust”, but for a long time they felt lumped in with, and unable to shake off the reputation, of a lot of 1980s jangle indie bands. “We were just perceived as a twee pop band,” Shields recalled back in 1992, while expressing a desire to make “pure noise for the hell of it.” While their indie association is understandable – there’s shared DNA, sensibilities, and friendships, not to mention early singles such as ‘Sunny Sundae Smile’ – the scene they stemmed from was much more porous.
The group also shared bills with the likes of Godflesh, Loop and Head of David as often as they did C86-adjacent bands. They are a firm part of a lineage that involves some of the heaviest music to have ever come out of the UK. Bizarrely, on the way into the venue this evening, there’s already a pair of discarded underpants on the stairwell. “There’s always someone who’ll shit themselves at the slightest excuse,” Shields said back in 2013.
However, as the band unleashes a torrent of volume – from the mutated drum & bass screech of ‘Wonder 2’, to the kick-to-the-stomach assault of ‘Feed Me With Your Kiss’ via a stunning ‘Only Tomorrow’ that somehow manages to sound as tender as it does brutal – what becomes clear is the overlooked calming impact this can have.
We are living in truly testing times, in which our brains are flooded non-stop with a rising tide of slop alongside news so depressing, disheartening, and devastating that it can feel challenging to hold onto anything resembling hope. Many people live in a constant search of a way to cut out the noise and find some stillness. From silent retreats and digital detoxes to mindfulness apps and nearly a billion people following Spotify’s utterly insipid Chill Out Music playlist, culturally we are always being sold that the way to rest, relax, unwind, and switch off is to quieten things down.
However, sometimes the most effective way to clear something is to flood it. From the second MBV start to play tonight, via a swooping, swaying yet pummeling ‘I Only Said’, there is an inescapable sensation that washes over me. There is a soothing, lulling, almost tranquil feeling to having the insides of your head rearranged through a surge of noise and volume that almost renders thought impossible. And on a really basic, simplistic level, to be at a gig that is so loud that you literally can’t hear the people next to you talking is a special kind of godsend relief that everyone is deserving of.
The band’s skill, of course, is to make a particular kind of noise that can be palatable and pretty, loaded with swirling sugary hooks, which results in something that can be immersive and dreamy rather than just pure discordant punishment. This is deeply engaging and thrilling music, loaded with textures to get lost in or that chews into you, but it is also numbing in a sense. There is a remarkable feeling of clarity and serenity that hits when this music lands at full force – a potent and uplifting feeling of peace and harmony can be triggered when you submit yourself to this onslaught and become sucked up in it. There is a purity that stems from it; a relaxed state that acts as more of an unplug from the world than all the floatation tanks and dodgy ambient records combined. Shields himself has spoken of this “zone” and “meditative state” that he gets into when playing. “It has very emotional connotations for me,” he said. “I have to keep very still when I’m playing. I can’t explain it. It is magic.”
Although there is no song more likely to immediately unpick any argument of noise as a cleansing force than the closing ‘You Made Me Realise’ and its obliterating noise breakdown section. At times it truly sounds like an exorcism of sorts, or that the band may just accidentally open up some kind of vortex that swallows the entire room. It is almost comically forceful and brutally unrelenting. But when it seamlessly lands back into the comparatively euphoric guitar riffs of the song’s main hook and chorus, it feels like seeing land after being lost at sea. “That’s it. Thanks. Sorry. Bye.” Shields says cheekily, well aware that he’s just dished out a beating of epic proportions.
But then, as silence replaces noise, and the bright white lights of the venue switch on and snap you back around from your stupor/meditation, The Stone Roses’ ‘Waterfall’ begins to play and the crowd bounces out of the room with a literal skip in their step. It must be Mani fucking about.
