WHY I NEVER GOT AROUND
TO LISTENING TO THIS ARTIST/ALBUM
- The first time I'd ever seen or heard of The Jesus and Mary Chain was in 1985 on the local Toronto music magazine television program The New Music, which would feature in-depth profiles and interviews with acts not normally covered by traditional media outlets. Most of the time, the mere fact that a band was being covered by The New Music would lead to me to seek out their material, or at the very least, look them in the latest music magazine (that's what we did before the interwebs). But The Jesus and Mary Chain's appearance on The New Music made me neither want to listen to their music, nor seek any information about them. Notwithstanding their minimalist instrumentation, which I usually went for in a big way, I had no interest in the shoe-gazer noise pop that Jim and William Reid had to offer, or in the antics of Douglas Hart, the drug-riddled bassist who only had two strings on his bass because he only used those two and didn't see the need to spend the money on the other two. Sure, it was a hilarious sound bite, but it did nothing to pique my interest in the band.
- Fast forward to June, 1990, my eighteenth summer. I go to Toronto's now-defunct CNE Grandstand to see Depeche Mode's World Violation Tour, with The Jesus and Mary Chain opening up. I was not much of a Depeche Mode fan, but Paul Lahey convinced me to go, with the promise of many teenage girls. While I genuinely enjoyed the Depeche Mode show, the same can not be said about The Jesus and Mary Chain's set, which was nothing but a wall of wailing distorted guitars drowning out the vocals. It was perhaps my least favourite show I have ever experienced (and that's saying a lot, considering that I've seen Living Color live). It was pretty much the same result at 1992's Lollapalooza show at Molson Park in Barrie, Ontario, where I thought The Jesus and Mary Chain were simply outclassed by the rest of the field, which included Pearl Jam, Ice Cube, Soundgarden, Ministry, and Red Hot Chili Peppers.
- Back in the late 80s,“Just Like Honey” and "Some Candy Talking" were songs that I would hear a lot at high school parties and on 102.1 CFNY, Toronto's modern rock radio station.
AFTER A WEEK OF
DIGESTING THIS ALBUM
- While it has been relatively easy to rid myself of preconceived notions of the records and artists I have chosen to feature for this project, I must say it was very difficult for me to try and put a fresh set of ears and an open mind to Psychocandy and The Jesus and Mary Chain.
- The record's dynamics do nothing for me. The droning guitar noise and the washed-out sound quality bore the living shit out of me. That being said, the one redeeming quality for much of Psychocandy is the songwriting. With “Just Like Honey”, “Sowing Seeds”, “Something's Wrong”, “Some Candy Talking”, “Never Understand”, and “You Trip Me Up” the Reid brothers write nearly perfect pop songs, which are hidden -- almost unlistenable -- under unnecessary layers of mucky guitars and/or vocal performances awash in pretentious effects.
- To paraphrase Sam Malone, I'd rather cut my hair with a cheese grater and chew on tin foil than sit through another listening of Psychocandy. No sexiness, no groove, no thanks!
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