The Jesus and Mary Chain
William / ZigZag
06.1985
06.1985
William the bad rounds up those knavish outlaws - the Jesus and Mary Chain
'The outburst came. The effect was even more powerful than before because no two of The Outlaws were singing the same tune.'
'William In Trouble'
"There's a lot of disgusting pop music. Close your eyes to the filthy and disgusting side of it and just look at the romance. It's easy if you just buy the records. It's more difficult if you've got to be in amongst the sewer... the pop music sewer. If you observe it from a distance it's much, much more romantic. If you've got to be in amongst it all it can be quite sick making."
Jim Reid
Similarities between The Jesus And Mary Chain and that other band can be fun to play with, but when it comes down to it they're pretty flimsy affairs. The difference is that the other group came along with the supposed intention of burying pop once and for all, while The Jesus And Mary Chain - to stretch a biblical allusion just about as far as it can go - have come to resurrect it.
Because behind the ruffian attitude that's always good for a few column inches, The Jesus And Mary Chain approach pop with a missionary zeal. If anything their ideas are far from radical. They're trying to reconstruct the old beast as it should have been and still might be, but unlike so many others who've attempted the task, The Jesus And Mary Chain possess the right instincts and they come brandishing gorgeous songs, shining great slabs of noise.
In a small Soho cafe William Reid and Douglas Hart are consuming cod and chips, while Jim - who says he hasn't slept for three days - abstains through tiredness. Bobby Gillespie is in Glasgow, having returned there are playing a London date with fellow Creation act Primal Scream. Since January the other three have been living in miserable bedsits in London's Muswell Hill. "You see," explains Jim, "the reason why Bobby is never with us at times like these is because he's in Primal Scream really, and drumming for us is just helping us out. Not many people realize that he's the singer in Primal Scream, not the drummer in The Jesus And Mary Chain."
The group have just finished recording their third single 'You Trip Me Up', a song which they'd already unveiled on last year's Peel session: "It's like the last two," Jim explains, "in as much as it's a good tune and it's quite lively."
It's their next assault after the disappointment of 'Never Understand' which had been expected to emerge in the top ten, but never showed its face there.
"We were extremely pissed off about that because that song was it," drawls Jim. "If ever I've heard a hit, that was it. We did our best. We recorded a top ten single. It's just extremely bloody irritating that some clown won't play our records because he thinks it's too noisy or something. If you bring out a record and you think it's bloody great and some wee fart idiot who's fifty five decides it's too risky for daytime play..."
"But the next one should be a hit," decides Douglas.
"'You Trip Me Up' is pure summer," Jim crashes on. "It should be number one for about forty-two weeks and then we'll take it to the United States Of America and then it'll be number one there."
"A nice pretty song," concludes William.
And WEA?
"They're treating us quite nicely, 'cause we're treating them quite nicely," answers Jim. "It's an understanding."
"We've got to get on," adds William. "We can't indulge ourselves living in the same house."
"We stay away from Warners as much as we can," continues Jim, "and it suits everybody really. I mean if the truth was being told we hate each other's guts, but we try to get along. That's all we can do. They treat us totally differently from any other groups... pretty much leave us to ourselves. I don't think they like handling us but it's to do with money. That's understandable because we see money in them so we're putting up with each other.
"A company like WEA can water people down and that's the big danger. It's a danger that we've successfully avoided. That's why we have so much trouble with them - that's why they despise us so much. But more groups should be aiming at the top then. There's too much safety involved in playing to your five thousand fans. If you really want to get ahead, if you really want to make pop music better...
"The world will never change, but pop music gets better from time to time. Every now and again some groups come along that are worthwhile. I think we're one of these groups. You can slightly change pop music for a short period of time, even if it always gets back into its totally disgusting state."
Don Quixote and the Mary Chain canter full tilt at the windmills. Pop music's quite a romantic venture for you isn't it.
"Yeah," responds William. "It is."
"There's something quite poetic about the actual words 'pop music'," continues Douglas.
"Well that's it," says Jim. "There is romance. The idea that in twenty years time people could be listening to 'You Trip Me Up' and thinking 'God Almighty, that was the summer of 1985'... That's one kind of nostalgia that I've got time for. I hate the other kind of nostalgia, people thinking 'Christ! Weren't The Sex Pistols a brilliant group! I wish there was another one. I wish punk rock would happen again,' That makes me sick."
"I think," suggests Douglas, "that you should try and put it across that we're not a punk group. We're a pop group. Punk belongs to a certain era. Pop goes across the board."
"Pop is shit," says Jim. "But at the moment we consider ourselves one of the best pop groups around. We don't want to be considered a punk group because we always associate punk with something that happened a hundred years ago. It's total nostalgia. If anything we're ahead of our time; for anybody to turn around and say well they're a good punk group is like a total slap in the face."
"When we say we're ahead of our time we're not saying we've got pretentions to the avant garde," expands Douglas. "We're just ahead of our time. I can see something happening in two or three years time. All those silly groups makin' no tunes. Anybody can make lots of noise and no tunes or melodies. I think that sooner or later people are going to realize... Some of the people who're making really amazing noises like Einsturzende Neubaten... I wish they'd go out and make a bloody pop song. I'd like to see something like Altered Images' 'I Could Be Happy' with metal bashing..."
"We do like to do experimental things," extrapolates Jim, "but most of what we do is get nice melodies and catchy tunes... Summer sounds: that about described us I would say. The summer sounds of The Jesus And Mary Chain... Back to romance. We're incredibly romantic."
"Incurably so," Douglas assents.
Do you lie about things - ('17 year old Jim Reid is the singer with The Jesus And Mary Chain') - things like your ages?
"Sometimes I lie about my age," Jim replies, "sometimes I don't. Sometimes I lie about what I had for my dinner as well. I'm a bit of a lying bastard."
Lies, lies, lies. Have you had any odd letters about your name?
William answers: "Usually from people who write on red paper with green ink. And they say 'You're sick you bastards, you're sick.'
"It's a proven fact," admonishes Jim. "I've told you this before, I read an article in The Observer and it said that people who write letters in green ink are psychopaths."
Who's the most obnoxious individual you've met?
"Nik Kershaw," says Jim. "He treated us like bastards. We met him down a dark alley one night and he tried to mug us."
"It was at the BBC studios," William tells the truth. "We went to get interviewed on the radio for Saturday live and he was there. No... actually he's a nice guy. Howard Jones: now he's a real bastard."
From Jim: "He's a two-faced wee back-stabbing shit."
When things get a bit out of order at gigs, does it scare the shite out of you?
William: "No."
"It depends how drunk you are," says Jim. "If you're not very drunk and a big hail of bottles comes at you, you get scared. If you're really drunk you tend to laugh."
Douglas interrupts: "And duck."
Jim says: "At North London Poly (the gig where the audience dismantled the PA, something which has no made it practically impossible for the Mary Chain to hire one to play anywhere) people were tring to break down the doors. That was quite frightening. I don't know if they were after autographs or they were after our blood but they were still trying to break down the doors."
"The ideal gig?" Jim continues. "It's when we could all be drunk or drugged to the perfect degree of happiness. The audience should smile or nod their heads because they were happy. Some of them would leave because they were disgusted."
"... and some," dreams William, "would throw money and roses."
"Your names, little boys," said the Vicar's wife, "are of course well known to me, and I have wished to hear you play for a long time. I can only say that it has far exceeded my expectations. Such verse - such execution - such gallant scorn of convention, such - such genius. And you composed it entirely yourself?"
"Yes," said William with perfect truth.
The mothers were stealing out, still casting glances of silent horror at The Outlaws.
'The outburst came. The effect was even more powerful than before because no two of The Outlaws were singing the same tune.'
'William In Trouble'
"There's a lot of disgusting pop music. Close your eyes to the filthy and disgusting side of it and just look at the romance. It's easy if you just buy the records. It's more difficult if you've got to be in amongst the sewer... the pop music sewer. If you observe it from a distance it's much, much more romantic. If you've got to be in amongst it all it can be quite sick making."
Jim Reid
Similarities between The Jesus And Mary Chain and that other band can be fun to play with, but when it comes down to it they're pretty flimsy affairs. The difference is that the other group came along with the supposed intention of burying pop once and for all, while The Jesus And Mary Chain - to stretch a biblical allusion just about as far as it can go - have come to resurrect it.
Because behind the ruffian attitude that's always good for a few column inches, The Jesus And Mary Chain approach pop with a missionary zeal. If anything their ideas are far from radical. They're trying to reconstruct the old beast as it should have been and still might be, but unlike so many others who've attempted the task, The Jesus And Mary Chain possess the right instincts and they come brandishing gorgeous songs, shining great slabs of noise.
In a small Soho cafe William Reid and Douglas Hart are consuming cod and chips, while Jim - who says he hasn't slept for three days - abstains through tiredness. Bobby Gillespie is in Glasgow, having returned there are playing a London date with fellow Creation act Primal Scream. Since January the other three have been living in miserable bedsits in London's Muswell Hill. "You see," explains Jim, "the reason why Bobby is never with us at times like these is because he's in Primal Scream really, and drumming for us is just helping us out. Not many people realize that he's the singer in Primal Scream, not the drummer in The Jesus And Mary Chain."
The group have just finished recording their third single 'You Trip Me Up', a song which they'd already unveiled on last year's Peel session: "It's like the last two," Jim explains, "in as much as it's a good tune and it's quite lively."
It's their next assault after the disappointment of 'Never Understand' which had been expected to emerge in the top ten, but never showed its face there.
"We were extremely pissed off about that because that song was it," drawls Jim. "If ever I've heard a hit, that was it. We did our best. We recorded a top ten single. It's just extremely bloody irritating that some clown won't play our records because he thinks it's too noisy or something. If you bring out a record and you think it's bloody great and some wee fart idiot who's fifty five decides it's too risky for daytime play..."
"But the next one should be a hit," decides Douglas.
"'You Trip Me Up' is pure summer," Jim crashes on. "It should be number one for about forty-two weeks and then we'll take it to the United States Of America and then it'll be number one there."
"A nice pretty song," concludes William.
And WEA?
"They're treating us quite nicely, 'cause we're treating them quite nicely," answers Jim. "It's an understanding."
"We've got to get on," adds William. "We can't indulge ourselves living in the same house."
"We stay away from Warners as much as we can," continues Jim, "and it suits everybody really. I mean if the truth was being told we hate each other's guts, but we try to get along. That's all we can do. They treat us totally differently from any other groups... pretty much leave us to ourselves. I don't think they like handling us but it's to do with money. That's understandable because we see money in them so we're putting up with each other.
"A company like WEA can water people down and that's the big danger. It's a danger that we've successfully avoided. That's why we have so much trouble with them - that's why they despise us so much. But more groups should be aiming at the top then. There's too much safety involved in playing to your five thousand fans. If you really want to get ahead, if you really want to make pop music better...
"The world will never change, but pop music gets better from time to time. Every now and again some groups come along that are worthwhile. I think we're one of these groups. You can slightly change pop music for a short period of time, even if it always gets back into its totally disgusting state."
Don Quixote and the Mary Chain canter full tilt at the windmills. Pop music's quite a romantic venture for you isn't it.
"Yeah," responds William. "It is."
"There's something quite poetic about the actual words 'pop music'," continues Douglas.
"Well that's it," says Jim. "There is romance. The idea that in twenty years time people could be listening to 'You Trip Me Up' and thinking 'God Almighty, that was the summer of 1985'... That's one kind of nostalgia that I've got time for. I hate the other kind of nostalgia, people thinking 'Christ! Weren't The Sex Pistols a brilliant group! I wish there was another one. I wish punk rock would happen again,' That makes me sick."
"I think," suggests Douglas, "that you should try and put it across that we're not a punk group. We're a pop group. Punk belongs to a certain era. Pop goes across the board."
"Pop is shit," says Jim. "But at the moment we consider ourselves one of the best pop groups around. We don't want to be considered a punk group because we always associate punk with something that happened a hundred years ago. It's total nostalgia. If anything we're ahead of our time; for anybody to turn around and say well they're a good punk group is like a total slap in the face."
"When we say we're ahead of our time we're not saying we've got pretentions to the avant garde," expands Douglas. "We're just ahead of our time. I can see something happening in two or three years time. All those silly groups makin' no tunes. Anybody can make lots of noise and no tunes or melodies. I think that sooner or later people are going to realize... Some of the people who're making really amazing noises like Einsturzende Neubaten... I wish they'd go out and make a bloody pop song. I'd like to see something like Altered Images' 'I Could Be Happy' with metal bashing..."
"We do like to do experimental things," extrapolates Jim, "but most of what we do is get nice melodies and catchy tunes... Summer sounds: that about described us I would say. The summer sounds of The Jesus And Mary Chain... Back to romance. We're incredibly romantic."
"Incurably so," Douglas assents.
Do you lie about things - ('17 year old Jim Reid is the singer with The Jesus And Mary Chain') - things like your ages?
"Sometimes I lie about my age," Jim replies, "sometimes I don't. Sometimes I lie about what I had for my dinner as well. I'm a bit of a lying bastard."
Lies, lies, lies. Have you had any odd letters about your name?
William answers: "Usually from people who write on red paper with green ink. And they say 'You're sick you bastards, you're sick.'
"It's a proven fact," admonishes Jim. "I've told you this before, I read an article in The Observer and it said that people who write letters in green ink are psychopaths."
Who's the most obnoxious individual you've met?
"Nik Kershaw," says Jim. "He treated us like bastards. We met him down a dark alley one night and he tried to mug us."
"It was at the BBC studios," William tells the truth. "We went to get interviewed on the radio for Saturday live and he was there. No... actually he's a nice guy. Howard Jones: now he's a real bastard."
From Jim: "He's a two-faced wee back-stabbing shit."
When things get a bit out of order at gigs, does it scare the shite out of you?
William: "No."
"It depends how drunk you are," says Jim. "If you're not very drunk and a big hail of bottles comes at you, you get scared. If you're really drunk you tend to laugh."
Douglas interrupts: "And duck."
Jim says: "At North London Poly (the gig where the audience dismantled the PA, something which has no made it practically impossible for the Mary Chain to hire one to play anywhere) people were tring to break down the doors. That was quite frightening. I don't know if they were after autographs or they were after our blood but they were still trying to break down the doors."
"The ideal gig?" Jim continues. "It's when we could all be drunk or drugged to the perfect degree of happiness. The audience should smile or nod their heads because they were happy. Some of them would leave because they were disgusted."
"... and some," dreams William, "would throw money and roses."
"Your names, little boys," said the Vicar's wife, "are of course well known to me, and I have wished to hear you play for a long time. I can only say that it has far exceeded my expectations. Such verse - such execution - such gallant scorn of convention, such - such genius. And you composed it entirely yourself?"
"Yes," said William with perfect truth.
The mothers were stealing out, still casting glances of silent horror at The Outlaws.
