playing this morning: jesus and the mary chain's 1985 debut psycho candy... what a great album! let me name the reasons... ok maybe not.. but this album is a classic that somehow remains a cult....the shoegazer movement really begins here, the pixies sound got a lot from this... this album embodies the best of music: melody, cool, experimental... what you get here are narcissistic songs about growing up combined with ramones/beachboys melodies refracted via velvet underground white noise all underpinned by that dark echo and the bunnymen vibe..... looking at the pictures of the reid brothers they in fact look like ian mcullough more than say robert smith.... bobby gillespie who would go on to more fame when he started up the primal scream after i guess deciding he would never be more than a second banana to the reid brothers' egos..well bobby plays the drums on this.... what to say bout the lp sonics? having i believe only heard this on cd til now - and i have not heard the recent rhino reissue (hard to believe this album was out of print domestically..we're talking the best album of 1985 and one of the touchstones of college rock)- i have to say the lp is dirtier , fuzzier yes grungier.... ultimately however i have to say a word about the songs.. there are some feedback showcases here but they are surrounded by some classic pop songs that the supremes or better yet ronnettes could have sung.. the feedback guitar wall has often been compared with the phil spector wall of sound and perhaps there is some truth to that.... the album's first track "just like honey" was featured to great effect by sofia coppola in "lost in translations" pivotal closing sense..it gave me goosebumps when i saw it.. not usually a big fan of using music to arouse emotion.. let the actors do the acting i say... but in this case coppola's use really hit a home run... anyways, this jesus and the mary chain album never gets old for me.. more like when i dig it out i'm always shocked as to how fresh and alive it sounds.
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