Stephin Merritt Bellucci Symposium

Stephin Merritt, who suffers from pain hyperacusis that is triggered by the sound of cymbals, suffered an abrupt onset of symptoms while performing live. His inability to tolerate a traditional drum kit forced him to reinvent his music and thereby arrive at what has become his signature sound. Merritt’s resulting master work, the Magnetic Fields’ 69 Love Songs, was named the second-best album of 1999 by the Village Voice, was included on lists of the greatest rock albums of all time by Rolling Stone and NME, and was included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, edited by critic Robert Dimery. Robert Cristgau, the famously acerbic rock critic at the Village Voice, said 69 Love Songs “upend[ed] my preconceptions the way high art's supposed to." ‪@MagneticFieldsOfficial‬ ‪@creightonuniversity‬