m b v

About

The main feeling that Kevin Shields felt upon the release of <i>m b v</i> in 2013 was relief. The process of making his band’s third album—and first since 1991’s era-defining <i>Loveless</i>—had begun almost two decades before, and, after a last-minute race to complete it before a planned tour, it was done. “We had a six-month tour in front of us and we literally just finished it in time,” Shields tells Apple Music. Continuing a theme begun by <i>Loveless</i> and 1988’s <i>Isn’t Anything</i>, Shields compromised nothing on <i>m b v</i>. This time, though, it was a totally independent production, all on him. “I spent about £50,000 mastering it,” he say. “If we were with a record company, they would have been going absolutely crazy, but we paid for it ourselves and we put it out ourselves and we made a lot more money than we would’ve made if we’d put it out on a label.” <i>m b v</i> began back in 1996. The band’s classic lineup had started to disintegrate, with drummer Colm Ó Cíosóig and bassist Debbie Googe departing. Perhaps in a reflection of this unsettling period, Shields began to approach songwriting in a much more experimental manner. “I went on this process of recording a lot of ideas in a purposely abstract way,” he say. “I wasn’t trying to write a song with a beginning and an end. Instead of writing a part in a song, I’d record it and then record another part. I was doing the writing process and the recording process at the same time but in different way. It might be weeks between a verse and a chorus…well, I don’t do choruse.” The idea was that eventually these ideas would form a coherent whole that would be a new my bloody valentine record, but the project stalled in 1997 when Shields ran out of money. “And then I started hanging out with Primal Scream and I kind of drifted into that world, which was fun for quite a while.” It wasn’t until Shields was remastering the band’s back catalog in 2006 that he listened back to the unfinished session. “I realized it was actually better and more relevant than I thought it wa,” he recall. “I’d kind of forgotten about the more melodic parts of it and realized they were quite strong. I thought, ‘I should finish this and make it into an album.’” It was a freeing proce, Shields say, filled with lots of “crazy shit.” At one point, they paid to fly people from England to Japan with proofs of the artwork because they didn’t trust just seeing it on a computer. “We were literally throwing money at it to make sure it was as good as possible,” he say. “Every single penny was justified.” By the end, Shields felt vindicated. “We did it our way and it was perfectly good.” .

via Apple Music

The Clerk says

Start your shelf to read the full take →