A bloody good Valentine gift
WHEN MY Bloody Valentine announced UK tour dates late last year, few fans regarded it as anything more than the victory lap of the band’s triumphant live reunion in 2008. Fewer would have imagined that they might play not only tracks from the fervently beloved Isn’t Anything and Loveless but unveil new material for the first time in over twenty years. Fewer still would have dared to dream that the tour would actually be in support of a new album – only their third overall and the first since 1991’s Loveless – which would not only be released before the live shows but actually live up to the legend of its storied predecessors. That happened, impossibly, wonderfully, with the surprise release of the astonishingly good MBV earlier this month. Hearing these songs form part of the band’s deafening live squall for the first time will be an experience for the ages.