As Czechoslovakia embraced democracy in the 1990s, bands such as Ecstasy of St Theresa and Here expressed their liberation in waves of layered guitar noise
‘Sting would not do that. The guitars are too loud, the voice too drowned.” Jan P Muchow, of Czech shoegaze band the Ecstasy of Saint Theresa, is remembering how sound engineers used to patronise them when they emerged at the dawn of the 1990s. But as Muchow says, “We didn’t want to be three universes close to anything like Sting”.
The Ecstasy despised guitar solos, used English lyrics and hid behind reverb and distortion. Czech listeners, accustomed largely to folk music or schlager pop, were not ready for it. “Our early tours outside Prague felt like Easy Rider,” Muchow remembers; organisers from the houses of culture, relics of communism across the country that would host concerts, were horrified by overpowered amps catching on fire, and audiences covered their ears when faced with massive walls of guitar.
