When the weather is icy-cold, the Cocteau Twins also make frequent appearances in the CD player, because this music is as far removed from "the blues" as you get (okay, maybe Sibelius is just a bit farther...). There's a glacial sheen to the sound, and the vocals are in some invented gibberish (no, really. She just sings nonsense syllables). The tunes are certainly memorable, but it's that icy remove that makes it such vital winter listening for me.
My Bloody Valentine takes part of the Cocteau Twins sound and exaggerates it even more. Vocals are buried in the mix, the guitars are frequently distorted beyond recognition, and there are often noises that sound like the recording equipment is malfunctioning. I let someone borrow my copy once and they returned it saying "It's the end of music as we know it" --- and he meant that in a bad way! I enjoy it because it sounds to me like pop music turned inside-out; the stuff we expect to be in the foreground isn't. Some people have called this the ultimate guitar album, but I think that's a little misleading, because anyone looking to hear "guitar" is going to be very confused. But it really is a pop album, not some industrial noise; dare I say, it's even beautiful.
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