My Bloody Valentine - Loveless

I'm not going to bother writing a long winded description about what a classic album this is. It's been said a million times and rightly so. I'll keep it short and sweet. To me this is the perfect expression of those heart wrenching feelings you experience when you're in the grip of being in love. A deeply sexy, sensual masterpiece.

It can be said that MBV were the founding fathers of Shoegazing but also killed the whole thing off. When they released "Loveless" in 1991, it made the albums by all the other bands unnecesserary, cos it compromised everything Shoegazing was meant to be and took it a lot further. Music like this hadn't been heard before and has never been produced again.

The thing that strikes you first is the sound, layer upon layer, vocals and rythms drowned in a huge wave of feedback and sounds you've never heard before. Shields achieved this by using guitars in ways that had never been thought of before and sampling them, to the effect that you sometimes think to hear a whole orchestra or flutes, but it's always just guitars really. It was an absolutely amazing piece of work and seemed to make all the other bands realise that they'd been foolish to think they could ever come up with anything as good as this, so they all shot off in different directions (Moose went country, Chapterhouse went dance, Lush and Boo Radleys went britpop and Catherine Wheel went shit).

When you're madly in love; when you're desperately lonely; when you're optimistic and full of joy; when you're pessimistic and waiting for the next giro to arrive; when you think everything makes sense; when you think nothing makes sense.... this album sums up all the parts good and bad of being human. the music has a depth few could not latch onto. This album is utterly incredible.

It's been over 12 years since its release, I still remember how it turned my concept of _music_ upside down the day I first listened to it. Never before (nor after) had anyone created a gigantic wall of distorted guitar noises that sounds so ethereal and soothing. Play it as loud as you can and put your head into the speakers, you'll feel like swimming in a whirl of sound (chemical assistance recommended). This is most certainly my favorite album of the '90s. I still listen to it regularly.

If you have ever wondered what the word 'multi-layered' meant in practical terms then I suggest you listen to the first track on this album - it makes you really wonder if you are actually sleeping or have just woken up.

"Loveless" is by far and away one of the most important records of the 90's, and remains an influential cornerstone to hundreds of artists worldwide. It is easily my one of my favorite albums of all-time.