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Bowel-shuddering basslines. Drum fills that bounce off the walls like gunfire. Guitars resembling a pneumatic drill drilling into another pneumatic drill. A truly loud gig stays with you, figuratively and literally, as anyone who has spent the days after one accompanied by a troubling ringing in their ears can confirm.
Last week, prompted, strangely enough, by an old Alistair Cooke column suggesting that Janis Joplin’s group Big Brother and the Holding Company was noisy enough to cause permanent hearing damage in guinea pigs, we asked Guide readers to share their own loudest gig experiences. We had a huge response, with tons of you sharing memories of eardrum-piercing encounters with all manner of bands and artists, across genres and decades. So we thought we’d devote this week’s newsletter to your stories of extreme noise terror, along with a few from the Guardian’s music critics, who are often on the frontlines when it comes to aural assault.
We should probably insert the obligatory (boring) disclaimer here: loud gigs can be genuinely bad for your ear health – just look at the brilliant early 80s post-punk band Mission of Burma, who had to disband for the best part of two decades due to guitarist Roger Clark Miller’s punishing tinnitus. The environments that Burma and bands before them played in were a sonic wild west, with minimal soundproofing in venues or, indeed, in the ear canals of the people performing in those venues. Thankfully technology has moved on since then: I have a pretty decent pair of earplugs immediately to hand on my keyring, and there’s always the free squashy ones behind the venue bar if you’re desperate – though some will always succumb to the cheap, inadvisable thrill of going unplugged.
Either way, ear-protected or otherwise, there’s nothing quite like a noisy gig. Let’s hear about some favourites …
Guardian writers on their loudest gigs
I saw My Bloody Valentine (vocalist/guitarist Bilinda Butcher, pictured top) play live a lot in the late 80s and early 90s. At one London show, I distinctly remember seeing the guy who was supposed to be in charge of the sound standing forlornly at his mixing desk, with his headphones off and his fingers in his ears. The mythology around how loud they were seemed to grow when the band was on hiatus, and at their 2008 comeback gig, they seemed intent on living up to it. Earplugs were distributed at the door. Even wearing them, the quite extraordinary volume was inescapable. It made your clothes move, independently of your body. Weirdly, it seemed to change the size of the venue: they were playing the Roundhouse, a former railway engine shed with a capacity of 3,000, but my memory tells me the gig took place in a tiny, claustrophobic room. At one point, I boldly elected to remove one earplug, just to see what it felt like. It felt like someone had slapped me, really hard, across the left ear. Lesson learned, I hastily put the earplug back in. Alexis Petridis, Guardian head rock and pop critic
The loudest gig I’ve ever seen was Sunn O))) at an ATP festival. For two minutes I watched these two men dressed as trees (as memory serves) playing gut-troublingly loud music and decided it wasn’t worth the risk. I’ve seen Sunn O))) at festivals twice since and still walked out: I’m not interested in volume for its own sake and – despite loving a lot of doom metal – don’t find their music interesting enough to justify it. But volume with purpose makes me feel like I’m transcending. Twice in the last week alone, whatever damage I’ve done to my eardrums has revived my soul. When Rosalía’s Lux tour stopped at London’s O2 arena last week, she had the Heritage Orchestra on the floor, playing at jet-landing volume. The freakout between the instrumentalists and the electronic backing track during her single Berghain was so intense that for a second my body figured the only logical reaction was one of pure panic; then the rapture set in. Days later, at the Brudenell Social Club in Leeds, I saw aliens of the hour Angine de Poitrine (pictured above) playing so loudly, and with such lunatic charge, that I felt like I’d been lashed to the prow of Mad Max’s rig as it screamed through the desert (this is a compliment). Laura Snapes, Guardian deputy music editor
I know from experience that Kevin Martin, AKA UK bass warrior the Bug, would rather walk away from a gig than let it not be loud enough, but evidently the sound system that was set up in a certain cramped Hoxton basement was deemed worthy. The date and circumstances of this unticketed gig now elude me – maybe a Boiler Room session? – but the noise his trio King Midas Sound whipped up was unforgettable. This was dub turned into post-apocalyptic terror: the slow skanking rhythm like a giant hammer in a quarry on a frozen planet, with a pyroclastic flow of noise seething between the beats. Without earplugs and worried it could seriously harm my hearing, I treated myself to occasional blasts in between trying to put my fingers in my ears in the most nonchalant manner I could manage. Ben Beaumont-Thomas, Guardian music editor
I experienced my loudest ever live performance in a pitch black room at Bristol’s Arnolfini gallery. Tim Hecker was topping a bill completed by fellow noiseniks Ben Frost and Ekoplex. I foolishly stood in front of the speakers and was physically pushed about by Hecker’s decaying loops from his career-best record Ravedeath, 1972. As his set drew to a close I realised I’d moved about 10 metres further back, after a primal survival instinct kicked in. Crazily, this was one of the first dates I took my partner on. Fifteen years later we’re married and have two kids. My snoring is bad but clearly nowhere near the rib-tickling output of Mr Hecker. Lanre Bakare, Guardian culture reporter
Guide readers on their loudest gigs
“In the early 70s I had the privilege of seeing virtually every major rock band and artist, most of them at Newcastle city hall. They were all unbelievably loud by today’s standards, but the loudest was without doubt Deep Purple (pictured above). I remember going to school the next day unable to hear a word the teachers said, and it took two days to recover fully … which perhaps explains why I need the subtitles constantly on the TV now.” – Paul Walsh
“In 1987, Happy Mondays were invited by The Farm to support them at their home town headliner at the wonderful Picket venue. After 50 years of gig-going, it’s still the loudest thing I’ve ever heard. Just thinking about the Mondays that night still makes my ears hurt 40 years on. No idea how they managed to be so loud or why they felt it necessary. Most people stayed in the bar but I was gripped by their chaotic, brutally loud noise. Can’t remember what The Farm were like that night because I was still reeling – and couldn’t hear a thing.” – Kevin McManus
“Jeff the Brotherhood in a dive bar (Luca Lounge, Auckland). I found an old supermarket receipt in my jacket pocket. Ripped that up and shoved it in my ears! Superb teeth-rattling gig.” – Lainey McNee
“Leftfield at Liverpool’s Royal Court theatre, 11 June 1996. The bass end of the Monster sound system they were using made the wooden panelling in the foyer rattle and buzz so loud, it almost drowned out the music going on inside. Throughout the show, flakes of plaster from the ceiling were floating down on to the crowd. I heard many years later that the reason the venue hosted comparatively few rock/dance acts thereafter (and at a carefully controlled volume, no doubt) was that Leftfield’s sound system had destabilised the building’s foundations! – Tim Barlow
“I went to see the Canadian band Piss at Brudenell Social Club last Sunday. Jesus Christ, it was an aural assault.” – Francis Fowles
“Loudest gig ever? That would be Swans at the Town and Country club in London in 1987. You couldn’t think of anything other than the noise while it was happening. People streamed out. I stayed and now wear hearing aids. But it was extraordinary.” – Keith Knight
“I saw Led Zeppelin play the Hardrock in Manchester in 1972. My ears are still ringing today after hearing Robert Plant belt out Immigrant Song that night. Motörhead loud? Not in the same league as prime Led Zeppelin.” – Myles Flynn
“Nickleback. The O2. Also, don’t judge me!” – Sharon Eckman
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