Shields and Company (MBV) are not done. Not by a long shot.

Look at those relaxed yet confident faces; they know what's in store for us. Here's what the clues tell me.

If you've read my book, which will come out in America on December 16th, you may remember Shields saying in 2008 at a Mojo Awards Event - in which Loveless was given was given the Classi Album Award, it's first real recognition - that the band only got as far as Revolver with Loveless. He made sure to get across that band members were all still friends. (Like so many others, he views his catalog through the lens of the Beatles catalog.)

He then said, in so may words, MBV have to release at least two more great albums and then they can go away and die. More and more, it's clear m b v was a mini album, or really two EPs is how I think of it. It was not a proper album. It's of great value. It's first rate material, worth of MBV. But it isn't a proper MBV album. He owes us at least two more. And I believe they are coming. Soon.

I came across a Vanity Fair article from their French edition (picture is from said article) the other day and it had a quote that tied in with what he said in 2008. While the article is from 2021, this quote that caught my attention in the article was from 2004. The article is about how inescapable their influence is despite their trials and tribulations. The article ends with this line, that conforms with so many other things Shields has said. ' "I didn't want to be a billionaire, I didn't want to become a rock star: I wanted to be an influence," he told me one day. Kevin Shields has certainly made a success of his life.'

Well YES, and NO.

As I said, the article was written in 2021, and I don't know the tone Shields used when he said that last quote. Did he feel defeated? He used the past tense, as if maybe the opportunity had passed him by. But we know that enough people got their work by 2008, and the reunion tours started. MBV have become a success by any measure. It tells you something that the majority of his audience at shows over the last ten years are predominantly under 35. When some younger journalist asks Thurston Moore about how Shields has influenced his playing, the look on Moore's face is priceless. If you are my age you'll know that Sonic Youth's Evol and Sister were one of many important influences on Shields, not the other way around.

But I don't believe Shields is satisfied. It's clear from that comment in 2004 and an interview in the New York Times in 2021 that he has more in store and wants to secure a more prominent place in the rock canon. Some members of the general public may have heard him in reference to Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation soundtrack in 2003. But most of the general public and musicians in other genres don't really know who he is. I think more is coming, not just because Shields has more to say, but because too often his influence isn't acknowledged, unless you talk to musicians like Robert Smith, The Edge, Trent Reznor, Brian Eno, Johnny Marr, Billy Corgan, he's going to seal the deal with some final albums, as he first mentioned in 2008. He is so much more than Loveless, although a large contingent of fans mainly know him for that album.

Every anecdote, whether it was his wife helping him record during Covid, or Colm and Debbie confirming since 2018 that things are, in fact, coming along. Music is being finished or is finished; that's what I believe. And with the live dates spread out the way they are, I can't help but think he wants to make up for lost time by putting out those two albums and doing a final world tour with his live show dialed in as never before.

Other than the Isn't Anything tour in 1989, in which they played with so little equipment mediating their playing, leaving people in awe of their dynamics and power, this 2025/2026 tour will be the one people will talk about for the rest of their lives. Not that the ones from 2008 to 2018 weren't a huge step up from their low point, the Loveless tour of 1991 and 1992. They certainly were, and bootlegs from 2018 show just how great things have gotten. But you have to be there; bootlegs are of little value when it comes to MBV.

I can't help but believe that Shields is in a relatively good place. Married, financially stable, two studios, practicing a martial art, dogs. But that doesn't change the fact that he simply records when it feels right. Why do we make such a big deal when a musican takes 15 years but an author taking 15 years is no big deal? His work is not disposable.

I believe that when you examine how the tour dates are spread out, a great deal of music is done, ready to be released and the empty months in 2026 will be filled in with shows and some random day an album will drop, and then another. Or maybe a double album and few EPs. Or a mini-album, a double album, and two EPs. More music is coming. And I'm guessing it's almost all done. I don't know this. Nobody told me anything. But that's the picture I see.

Shields wants his music to connect with people and make us all feel more connected. And I was pleased with a quote about the Fender Blender that said something to the effect that while it won't make you sound like him, it will help you think about sound like him. Oh, and for good measure he added, 'disregard the booklet.' He wants people to realize their creative potential. But his creative ambitions and potential has not been met yet, despite how that Vanity Fair article ended.

He's not done. Not by a long shot.