Some People Never Understand
Max Bell /
1985
1985
The most revolting and disgusting group I've ever heard" - that's one description of The Jesus And Mary Chain. Some jealous rival perhaps? Nope - that's what their own record company man reckons. Max Bell meets a new group you either love or hate.
Do you like to sprinkle parmesan cheese onto your spaghetti bolognese? William Reid, guitarist with The Jesus And Mary Chain, doesn't advise you to.
"I worked in a cheese warehouse once packing up cheeses from around the world. It was a high class joint, not a processed Kraft factory.
"My main task was to inspect the parmesans because cockroaches thrive on them. Cockroaches get really fat on parmesan. I had to go through the cheeses, find the cockroaches burrowing inside, pull 'em out and stomp them."
More lasagne anyone? Perhaps not. Suddenly the idea seems slightly disgusting.
The Jesus And Mary Chain have themselves been described in every shade of disgusting.
As a period of glossy slop pop draws wearily to a close, the Chain are pulling against the tide. Their first two records 'Upside Down' and their new single 'Never Understand', are the first pop records in an age to excite polar reactions of love and hate.
THRASH THRASH
The Jesus And Mary Chain make a racket which is an alliance between trash, squalor, surf and scruff.
In 1957 they called it rock'n'roll. In 1985 it hardly exists in the mainstream. Frankie may have shocked people but even they made music not 'noise'.
Singer Jim Reid, as soft-spoken offstage as he is manic on, wants people to appreciate the JAMC are a pop group with aspirations to being on Top Of The Pops soon and making top five hit singles.
"Call us a 1980s British Beach Boys or whatever. But everything we make sounds like a pop song, even if its different to any other pop song and even if it might not suit the daytime radio programmers.
"I think 'Never Understand' is fairly conventional."
Bassist Douglas Hart holds out few hopes for its chances.
"It's too much of a racket for the DJs. People will tune in and think, 'What's that whistling noise?'"
Indeed they will. Those brave enough to remove the ear mufflers certainly won't hear any Fairlights or other such studio sophistication.
'Never Understand' is dirty, mean and angry urban pop, more in line with The Ramones, Joy Division or The Velvet Underground than the all-pervasive smooth radio-refined rock.
HERE COMES TROUBLE
The Jesus And Mary Chain sometimes give the impression that it's them against the world.
Since coming to live in a squalid bedsit in Fulham from East Kilbride, Glasgow - "a new town, a dump" - they've gained a reputation for attracting trouble at concerts.
They've had the power pulled in Liverpool, been threatened with physical violence by rioting fans and promoters!
At the last count half a dozen JAMC shows have been cancelled by venues. When they have played, the Chain's reputation has preceded them. Packed houses are the norm.
Stories abound of their antics at their record company WEA. Of Rod Stewart gold discs smashed, blu-tak on the secretaries' biros, obscenities scribbled over posters - just the sort of high jinx you'd expect from a normal bunch of teenagers set loose on the absurd side of the pop industry.
"Most of the stories are true though some are exaggerated," Jim deadpans.
"At concerts maybe ten per cent go for the wrong reasons. If someone throws a glass at you or shouts 'f--- off', well you don't have to take that.
"But at the end of the night we're laughing. They paid mooney to see us."
PUNK IS DEAD
Because of this irreverent approach, The Jesus And Mary Chain have been hailed in some quarters as new punk messiahs, the new Sex Pistols - which is the kiss of death.
Jim, William, Douglas and drummed Bobby say they were only ten or eleven when punk rock slithered out of the ground.
"We've got an attitude which has something in common with punk but that's all," says Jim.
"A lot of groups now are making middle-aged music and young people are buying it. The glamorous pop groups could be Barry Manilow. There's little choice.
"What we offer is something wilder and noisier.
"I don't lose sleep thinking about Wham, because we'd like to be extremely huge and extremely popular with girls too. But we'd like to be more akin to The Beatles of The Rolling Stones. The Stones were scruffy bastards, degenerates.
"A teenypop image appeals to me and so does having lots of money. I'd like ten million in cash under the bed."
William points out the false sense of mystery which has crept back into pop, the lie that equates instrumental competence with artistic excellence.
"If you can play a barre chord you can play any song under the sun. With us, forming the group came before we had the instruments or ever learnt to play them.
"I think we'd decided that we weren't cut out for proper jobs. This isn't work, It's enjoyable..."
TUBE STRAIN
The brief moment of satisfaction is interrupted by Jim who qualifies his brother's enthusiasm: "Until the film crew from The Tube arrive. They came to our Liverpool gig and despised us totally," he says proudly.
"We'd been told to be on our best behaviour so we got hideously drunk and played totally haywire. We've never been on TV."
Ken Scorfield, The Tube's associate producer, confirmed that The Jesus And Mary Chain wouldn't be booked.
"I get out to see lots of bands," he told me, "and quite honestly I didn't like them. They weren't right.
"There are no sinister reasons for this. They had sound problems but from the outset people were leaving in droves. It was a shambles."
That's what they said about The Sex Pistols. But The Jesus And Mary Chain refuse to be guardians of some spurious pop-punk tradition, and they recognise the banal snobbery of the new pop establishment.
"There's no reason why we can't say we like Einsturzende Neubauten and Dollar. A lot of the music we listed to has nothing to do with hardcore.
"Pop is just slightly worse than usual at the moment. Why don't you ask us what our favourite colours are? That's so much more interesting."
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
OK.
"Mine's turquoise," says William.
"Mine's red," says Douglas.
"And mine's yellow," says Jim. "What's wrong with yellow?"
In the same order their favourite foods are sausage and chips, pot noodle and a fish supper. According to Douglas, "Our motto is unwrap it and shove it down your gob."
I left The Jesus And Mary Chain arguing about the merits of pot noodle, what happened to it during the course of ingestion, digestion and expulsion.
At WEA someone in the marketing department described Jesus And Mary Chain to me as "the most revolting and disgusting group I've ever heard" and he didn't mean it as a compliment.
I couldn't be bothered to point out that he was right, The Jesus And Mary Chain ar guilty on all counts. That's why they're so welcome.
Some people, they never understand.
Do you like to sprinkle parmesan cheese onto your spaghetti bolognese? William Reid, guitarist with The Jesus And Mary Chain, doesn't advise you to.
"I worked in a cheese warehouse once packing up cheeses from around the world. It was a high class joint, not a processed Kraft factory.
"My main task was to inspect the parmesans because cockroaches thrive on them. Cockroaches get really fat on parmesan. I had to go through the cheeses, find the cockroaches burrowing inside, pull 'em out and stomp them."
More lasagne anyone? Perhaps not. Suddenly the idea seems slightly disgusting.
The Jesus And Mary Chain have themselves been described in every shade of disgusting.
As a period of glossy slop pop draws wearily to a close, the Chain are pulling against the tide. Their first two records 'Upside Down' and their new single 'Never Understand', are the first pop records in an age to excite polar reactions of love and hate.
THRASH THRASH
The Jesus And Mary Chain make a racket which is an alliance between trash, squalor, surf and scruff.
In 1957 they called it rock'n'roll. In 1985 it hardly exists in the mainstream. Frankie may have shocked people but even they made music not 'noise'.
Singer Jim Reid, as soft-spoken offstage as he is manic on, wants people to appreciate the JAMC are a pop group with aspirations to being on Top Of The Pops soon and making top five hit singles.
"Call us a 1980s British Beach Boys or whatever. But everything we make sounds like a pop song, even if its different to any other pop song and even if it might not suit the daytime radio programmers.
"I think 'Never Understand' is fairly conventional."
Bassist Douglas Hart holds out few hopes for its chances.
"It's too much of a racket for the DJs. People will tune in and think, 'What's that whistling noise?'"
Indeed they will. Those brave enough to remove the ear mufflers certainly won't hear any Fairlights or other such studio sophistication.
'Never Understand' is dirty, mean and angry urban pop, more in line with The Ramones, Joy Division or The Velvet Underground than the all-pervasive smooth radio-refined rock.
HERE COMES TROUBLE
The Jesus And Mary Chain sometimes give the impression that it's them against the world.
Since coming to live in a squalid bedsit in Fulham from East Kilbride, Glasgow - "a new town, a dump" - they've gained a reputation for attracting trouble at concerts.
They've had the power pulled in Liverpool, been threatened with physical violence by rioting fans and promoters!
At the last count half a dozen JAMC shows have been cancelled by venues. When they have played, the Chain's reputation has preceded them. Packed houses are the norm.
Stories abound of their antics at their record company WEA. Of Rod Stewart gold discs smashed, blu-tak on the secretaries' biros, obscenities scribbled over posters - just the sort of high jinx you'd expect from a normal bunch of teenagers set loose on the absurd side of the pop industry.
"Most of the stories are true though some are exaggerated," Jim deadpans.
"At concerts maybe ten per cent go for the wrong reasons. If someone throws a glass at you or shouts 'f--- off', well you don't have to take that.
"But at the end of the night we're laughing. They paid mooney to see us."
PUNK IS DEAD
Because of this irreverent approach, The Jesus And Mary Chain have been hailed in some quarters as new punk messiahs, the new Sex Pistols - which is the kiss of death.
Jim, William, Douglas and drummed Bobby say they were only ten or eleven when punk rock slithered out of the ground.
"We've got an attitude which has something in common with punk but that's all," says Jim.
"A lot of groups now are making middle-aged music and young people are buying it. The glamorous pop groups could be Barry Manilow. There's little choice.
"What we offer is something wilder and noisier.
"I don't lose sleep thinking about Wham, because we'd like to be extremely huge and extremely popular with girls too. But we'd like to be more akin to The Beatles of The Rolling Stones. The Stones were scruffy bastards, degenerates.
"A teenypop image appeals to me and so does having lots of money. I'd like ten million in cash under the bed."
William points out the false sense of mystery which has crept back into pop, the lie that equates instrumental competence with artistic excellence.
"If you can play a barre chord you can play any song under the sun. With us, forming the group came before we had the instruments or ever learnt to play them.
"I think we'd decided that we weren't cut out for proper jobs. This isn't work, It's enjoyable..."
TUBE STRAIN
The brief moment of satisfaction is interrupted by Jim who qualifies his brother's enthusiasm: "Until the film crew from The Tube arrive. They came to our Liverpool gig and despised us totally," he says proudly.
"We'd been told to be on our best behaviour so we got hideously drunk and played totally haywire. We've never been on TV."
Ken Scorfield, The Tube's associate producer, confirmed that The Jesus And Mary Chain wouldn't be booked.
"I get out to see lots of bands," he told me, "and quite honestly I didn't like them. They weren't right.
"There are no sinister reasons for this. They had sound problems but from the outset people were leaving in droves. It was a shambles."
That's what they said about The Sex Pistols. But The Jesus And Mary Chain refuse to be guardians of some spurious pop-punk tradition, and they recognise the banal snobbery of the new pop establishment.
"There's no reason why we can't say we like Einsturzende Neubauten and Dollar. A lot of the music we listed to has nothing to do with hardcore.
"Pop is just slightly worse than usual at the moment. Why don't you ask us what our favourite colours are? That's so much more interesting."
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
OK.
"Mine's turquoise," says William.
"Mine's red," says Douglas.
"And mine's yellow," says Jim. "What's wrong with yellow?"
In the same order their favourite foods are sausage and chips, pot noodle and a fish supper. According to Douglas, "Our motto is unwrap it and shove it down your gob."
I left The Jesus And Mary Chain arguing about the merits of pot noodle, what happened to it during the course of ingestion, digestion and expulsion.
At WEA someone in the marketing department described Jesus And Mary Chain to me as "the most revolting and disgusting group I've ever heard" and he didn't mean it as a compliment.
I couldn't be bothered to point out that he was right, The Jesus And Mary Chain ar guilty on all counts. That's why they're so welcome.
Some people, they never understand.
