When I was nineteen I saw Hawkwind at the Rainbow Theatre in London. Lemmy was in the band on bass and vocals at the time and they’d just had a big hit with Silver Machine, which was the main reason I was there. But what I remember most about the concert was the volume – and the topless dancer – but mostly the volume. It was so loud that at one point I hid behind the seats, on my knees, crouched on the floor with my fingers in my ears. An unforgettable experience. I’ve had a ringing tone in my ears ever since that evening and for years after that I couldn’t stand to be anywhere which was too quiet. I couldn’t imagine myself ever living anywhere except a big, noisy city which would block out that ringing, but it seems you can get used to anything. Incidentally Lemmy’s Motorhead are number 6 on the list of loudest bands ever and Hawkwind are not on the list at all.
Famously, The Beatles played massive arenas in the USA in the mid-60s, with specially-built 100 watt Vox amplifiers (wow!). At Shea Stadium in New York, the 55,600 fans there could hear nothing apart from each other screaming and some buzzing and squeaking in the background which would have been the Beatles. They had no listening system onstage and couldn’t hear each other playing, which must have been a nightmare. Simply put, the sound was terrible and they were nowhere near loud enough. But when bigger and better sound rigs were developed in the late 60s, many bands squeezed every decibel out of them that they could. It was a badge of honour to be loud and the louder you were, the bigger you were. Some of the old megabands were famous for being terrifyingly loud and even bragged about it. Bands like The Who (Pete Townsend has had problems with tinnitus for many years), Kiss, Led Zeppelin, Motorhead, and AC/DC, to name a few, broke records for loudness. I used to think that outrageous volume was a thing of the past, but that’s not the case.
My Morning Jacket at Munchenbryggeriet in Stockholm in 2011 were painfully loud. I’d bought earplugs from a seller outside the venue, just in case, but I forgot them in my evening jacket in the cloakroom. I felt like an idiot standing there with my fingers in my ears and no seat to hide behind. It’s a pity though, because they were actually very good. Even locally there’s been some of that. Hogan’s Heroes (who? what?) in Högbo Bruk, with one of my old guitarist heroes Albert Lee, were also deafening. I was near the front when the show started, drifted towards the back after a couple of songs, but after about 20 minutes I gave it up, slipped out to the carpark and drove home. I just couldn’t listen to it, which also made me pretty pissed off. I had paid to see the band, but couldn’t stand being in the same room as them. So is that my fault or the band’s? Or Högbo Bruk’s? Or is it just the deaf guy behind the mixing desk that’s at fault? Morrisey wrote a song in which he sang critically about DJs many years ago (Panic), for which he also got a lot of criticism. Maybe he should have written one about a mixing engineer instead? Whatever, I should have been given a refund.