"Never Understand", probably the standout track from "Psychocandy" contains one of the most heavily distorted guitar riffs ever recorded, and reminds me of the sound of massive panes of glass breaking into individual shards while being levitated within the funnel of a gigantic cyclone. It's a backwash of pure, tuneful feedback meshed with a thick, propulsive bassline and rudimentary drumming while a warm, disaffected male voice mourns that his girl will "Never understand me/never understand me".
The Jesus and Mary Chain have been described by critics and admirers alike as sounding like the "..Beach Boys on acid", with their guitar sound famously described as "..chainsaws in a hurricane." The fourteen songs on their first release are raw, sometimes aggressively paced, at others bouncy and harmonious, short, and often cluttered with feedback, yet retain a kind of hypnotic, highly melodic sound to them. Many of these songs were college radio standards when "Alternative" meant "way out of the mainstream." And they were played frequently, which is where I first heard "Never Understand", "The Hardest Walk", "Just Like Honey", "Cut Dead", "Sowing Seeds", and "Taste of Cindy". This was a landmark CD, and its influence is impossible to overestimate; while looking over their shoulder at the Velvet Underground as their spiritual predecessors, the Jesus and Mary Chain essentially provided the blueprint for shoegazing rock, a debt freely acknowledged by Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine, whose "Isn't Anything" is widely considered to be the first proper shoegazing release.
But don't get it just because it's a pioneering release. Buy it because it's a catchy pop masterpiece that just about totally subverts that genre by burying it under heavily distorted guitar riffs and a massive wash of feedback. Buy it because it's melodic, hummable, and as memorable on the five-hundredth listen as it is on the first. This is as close to a can't-miss recording as I have heard in the 25 years since its release. Just buy it. Kabalabonga
The Jesus and Mary Chain have been described by critics and admirers alike as sounding like the "..Beach Boys on acid", with their guitar sound famously described as "..chainsaws in a hurricane." The fourteen songs on their first release are raw, sometimes aggressively paced, at others bouncy and harmonious, short, and often cluttered with feedback, yet retain a kind of hypnotic, highly melodic sound to them. Many of these songs were college radio standards when "Alternative" meant "way out of the mainstream." And they were played frequently, which is where I first heard "Never Understand", "The Hardest Walk", "Just Like Honey", "Cut Dead", "Sowing Seeds", and "Taste of Cindy". This was a landmark CD, and its influence is impossible to overestimate; while looking over their shoulder at the Velvet Underground as their spiritual predecessors, the Jesus and Mary Chain essentially provided the blueprint for shoegazing rock, a debt freely acknowledged by Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine, whose "Isn't Anything" is widely considered to be the first proper shoegazing release.
But don't get it just because it's a pioneering release. Buy it because it's a catchy pop masterpiece that just about totally subverts that genre by burying it under heavily distorted guitar riffs and a massive wash of feedback. Buy it because it's melodic, hummable, and as memorable on the five-hundredth listen as it is on the first. This is as close to a can't-miss recording as I have heard in the 25 years since its release. Just buy it. Kabalabonga
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