Buried within my Mutek musings was the true story (not to say that the rest of that Montreal trip was untruthful) of my search and find of Primal Scream's "Swastika Eyes" single. However, that crucially awesome item was in fact a distant second on my "to find" list. And after resolving my search for Number Two, the only rational follow-up was to conclude my search for Number One, without delay.

My Bloody Valentine. Loveless.

The problem: MBV were dropped by Creation almost immediately after the album's release. They are still (to the best of my knowledge) signed to Virgin, and their Creation recordings are now owned by Sony. Re-printing the album on vinyl is not a priority. Therefore, all existing vinyl copies were printed by the now-defunct Creation in 1991. After searching both North American coasts, I've concluded that hardly any of these copies are on this continent, either.

The solution: Ebay. A careful search and one damned fine deal later, Loveless was on its way from the UK and into my waiting hands. Typical auction prices for the record are between $40 and $50 USD. I paid a lot less. I'm Jewish, so I had to make sure everyone understands that.

The record: The outer sleeve is in good condition, the record itself is near pristine.

The sound: I'm used to hearing the occasional new things when listening to the album. Such is the complexity and density of the recording. But I'm not used to hearing several new things in one sitting.

Anyone who's a vinyl-phile or has read my musings on the vinyl vs CD sound quality debate (which of course, is a no-contest one-sided debate) knows what I'm about to write. CD: high frequencies = stifled, bass = sludgy. Vinyl: the coast is clear. But I was surprised by how much more of a ROCK record Loveless becomes on vinyl. The blended murkiness of the CD accentuates the swirling, other-worldly headspaces. On record, some of this fog is blown clear away, revealing actual strumming underneath the din. And the vocals, naturally, are sharper and more nuanced.

I didn't listen too carefully to "Only Shallow". It would be difficult to difficult to discern warped vinyl from actual sound with this track, so I just let it play. "Loomer" carries a strong kick, and "Touched" is "Touched". "To Here Knows When" peels away the layers and allows the soft percussion to peek through.

Then it's the heavy stuff, and the heavy revelations. The bass on "When You Sleep" is quaking, resonating and shaking the speakers. This is the magic of vinyl -- you can hear separation between guitars and bass, rather than the across-the-whole-track blanketing of the bass sounds on a CD. The concluding minutes of "I Only Said" are propelled forward by guitars that rev up every other bar like a Formula One car shifting gears at 150 mph. These accents and attacks are severely curtailed on the CD, and I took delight in playing the two formats simultaneously for the sake of the lopsided comparison. Then I played the end of "I Only Said" four times in a row and listened through headphones to marvel at its marvelousness.

"Come In Alone"'s bass is more quaking goodness, and "Sometimes" carries the same jump-out-of-the-speakers mid-fi kick that "Loomer" did. "Blown A Wish" features unexpected sublime twinkling cascades on top of it's existing expected sublime twinkling cascades. "What You What" is a snarling rocker, and "Soon"'s strumming (heretofore unnoticed and unappreciated by me) stands out.

MBV are certainly part of the Velvet Underground inner circle -- everyone who hears/heard them forms/formed a band. But with the first wave of Velvets adorers, at least they were hearing the record on vinyl rather than the awful mid-80's remastered version that stinks up shiny 5" discs worldwide. But with MBV "Loveless", so much of the inspiration and hero worship comes from people who haven't heard the vinyl. They're hearing a very different album. They're admiring something which only exists on CD, something that doesn't exist on vinyl, never existed in the studio, and never happened in live performance. Obviously, all this applies equally well to me as it does to countless others. And don't read this like I'm thumbing my nose at the ignorant masses, "I have the vinyl but you don't ha ha ha". I took a long look at my CD closet and tried to imagine how much I'm missing. How much better it could all sound.

Besides, a CD is what it is, and there's something to be said for it's heightened sensations of swirl and eddy. Some people might prefer this, and find the greater clarity of the vinyl less inspirational. Which is OK. But there's no denying that you can hear more things on a vinyl recording. Almost always, I'll prefer hearing to not hearing.