The Sobering Messiah
Michael Dwyer / Drum Media
25.04.1995
25.04.1995
It's 1984, backstage at England's Crystal Palace, and Jim and William Reid are preparing to die.
The handful of people on the claustrophobic side of the dressing room door watch in horror as it shudders under the relentless kicking of a frenzied, unseen enemy. Outside, an angry mob of 1800 has converted its idolatry for the Jesus and Mary Chain into wanton bloodlust. There is no rear exit.
"We had this hopelessly misguided idea that people would prefer quality over quantity," sighs William Reid in a worn Scottish lilt, recalling the ordeal as if it was yesterday's nightmare.
"We spent the entire time between 1984 and 1990 incredibly drunk on stage. And sometimes that works. Sometimes there can be this really exciting energy from being horribly drunk. And sometimes it can just be horrible. Sometimes it could be really scary.
"That particular time we'd come off stage after only playing about 10 minutes. We really thought that was best. If we were playing like shit and it was just absolutely terrible we'd stop. We'd just walk off. And people didn't get that..."
People didn't as a rule, get The Jesus and Mary Chain. For all their plaudits as heroes of the post-new wave, for every hyper-ventilating rock journalist doing backflips over Psychocandy, for every gig riot, radio band and arrest for drugs and/or obscenity, the brothers Reid from East Kilbride have been nothing if not misunderstood.
10 years after the event, Psychocandy may still be the masterpiece the UK press hailed, but the Mary Chain have covered a few more sonic bases since. As Reid the elder wearily explains, their debut's veneer of feedback and overdrive, largely discarded on the subsequent Darklands LP and revisited only sporadically since, was far from the point of the exercise.
"It's probably a common complaint among bands and it may be a cliche, but yeah, I feel misunderstood a lot. Me and Jim have been trying to tell people for 11 years now that all that matters is the songs. The production of songs is just something we do. However they sound is just down to our moods or notions of that year.
"It pissed me off with this record, for instance (Stoned and Dethroned), that all of the reviewers in the UK have talked about how there's no noise on it. That's just so f--kin' irritating! That, for me, seems to be the shallowest perceptions of this album. It's got a lot of good songs on it! And we've been telling 'em for 11 years that that's what we do; that's all we want to do.
"Noise is just a tool. Sometimes you use it and sometimes you don't. Like sometimes we use keyboards, you know? We're rather good at noise and when you do it, obviously it takes a high profile, but it really disappoints me that people can't see that that's not what we're about."
During their recent, extensive US tour with Mazzy Star, America demonstrated a more flexible attitude to The Jesus and Mary Chain as a band equally at home with howls of feedback and the moody, acoustic subtleties of Stoned and Dethroned.
In Candy-obsessed Britain, however, the critics continue to behave, as only the English can, like jilted lovers. The band hasn't toured there for three years largely because, as Jim Reid told The Drum last August, "there always seems to be a queue of people who want to kick the Mary Chain."
"After Psychocandy people thought we were gonna come up with more of the same stuff," William says. "I think that's been a problem. Not our problem, but a problem people have with us. They don't really know where we stand sometimes. We're always moving away.
"Listen to The Velvet Underground," he offers. "No way were they a noisy, aggressive, feedback band. They did that, but they were also capable of incredibly beautiful, intimate acoustic songs and that was part of what made them so great. And the same goes for The Beatles or the Rolling Stones and lots of other bands that I loved. They were capable of showing you more than one trick."
From a media perspective, of course, the neatest tricks are the ones most prone to disaster and mayhem. In the mid-'80s, it was hard to get more extreme and nihilistic than The Jesus and Mary Chain. Drug arrests, a tendency for gigs to degenerate into riots and a series of singles banned on grounds of obscenity or blasphemy fuelled one of the more anarchic images of the post-punk era.
How responsible were the Brothers Reid for all the violence? Were they not deliberately inciting subversion, a certain amount of kicking against the pricks, if not the actual dressing room door?
"If we were responsible, none of it would have happened," William Reid insists. "It was totally beyond our control. The music was supposed to shake things up, we weren't into actual violence. But (Creation Records impressario) Alan McGee started to encourage a lot of it, spouting on about Art Terrorism and all this bullshit..."
With the benefit of hindsight, as a British rock legend who's been beaten up and savagely shopped down again, how has William Reid viewed each subsequent wave of musical fashion in the UK? As he watched punk and neo-romanticism give way to Madchester, The New Wave of New Wave and Bristol Trip-Hop, does he tend to tremble with excitement or smirk with cynicism?
"I embrace what's good about them. Sometimes good groups come out of these movements. Like the Manchester dance thing. Out of that we got the Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays. That wasnae too bood.
"But more often than not in this country the trends are too short-lived and they really don't have any substance. It's kind of embarrassing. You don't notice it so much when you live here but I spent most of the past year in America and viewing Britain from outside is embarrassing. I'm sure you know what I mean."
Oh, we do.
The Jesus and Mary Chain tour Australia for the first time in seven years next month, kicking off in Perth on May 4. Besides the Reid brothers, the band includes long-time Australian guitarist Ben Lurie, drummed Steve Monti and bassist Lincoln Fong.
William Reid promises "a lot of old stuff" tempering their determinedly progressive streak, with every album represented over the course of a show destined to be a little more controlled and precise than the Jesus and Mary Chain of old.
"These days we're more interested in playing the songs, getting them across properly," he says, "and getting drunk. We still get drunk, but not nearly as badly."
The handful of people on the claustrophobic side of the dressing room door watch in horror as it shudders under the relentless kicking of a frenzied, unseen enemy. Outside, an angry mob of 1800 has converted its idolatry for the Jesus and Mary Chain into wanton bloodlust. There is no rear exit.
"We had this hopelessly misguided idea that people would prefer quality over quantity," sighs William Reid in a worn Scottish lilt, recalling the ordeal as if it was yesterday's nightmare.
"We spent the entire time between 1984 and 1990 incredibly drunk on stage. And sometimes that works. Sometimes there can be this really exciting energy from being horribly drunk. And sometimes it can just be horrible. Sometimes it could be really scary.
"That particular time we'd come off stage after only playing about 10 minutes. We really thought that was best. If we were playing like shit and it was just absolutely terrible we'd stop. We'd just walk off. And people didn't get that..."
People didn't as a rule, get The Jesus and Mary Chain. For all their plaudits as heroes of the post-new wave, for every hyper-ventilating rock journalist doing backflips over Psychocandy, for every gig riot, radio band and arrest for drugs and/or obscenity, the brothers Reid from East Kilbride have been nothing if not misunderstood.
10 years after the event, Psychocandy may still be the masterpiece the UK press hailed, but the Mary Chain have covered a few more sonic bases since. As Reid the elder wearily explains, their debut's veneer of feedback and overdrive, largely discarded on the subsequent Darklands LP and revisited only sporadically since, was far from the point of the exercise.
"It's probably a common complaint among bands and it may be a cliche, but yeah, I feel misunderstood a lot. Me and Jim have been trying to tell people for 11 years now that all that matters is the songs. The production of songs is just something we do. However they sound is just down to our moods or notions of that year.
"It pissed me off with this record, for instance (Stoned and Dethroned), that all of the reviewers in the UK have talked about how there's no noise on it. That's just so f--kin' irritating! That, for me, seems to be the shallowest perceptions of this album. It's got a lot of good songs on it! And we've been telling 'em for 11 years that that's what we do; that's all we want to do.
"Noise is just a tool. Sometimes you use it and sometimes you don't. Like sometimes we use keyboards, you know? We're rather good at noise and when you do it, obviously it takes a high profile, but it really disappoints me that people can't see that that's not what we're about."
During their recent, extensive US tour with Mazzy Star, America demonstrated a more flexible attitude to The Jesus and Mary Chain as a band equally at home with howls of feedback and the moody, acoustic subtleties of Stoned and Dethroned.
In Candy-obsessed Britain, however, the critics continue to behave, as only the English can, like jilted lovers. The band hasn't toured there for three years largely because, as Jim Reid told The Drum last August, "there always seems to be a queue of people who want to kick the Mary Chain."
"After Psychocandy people thought we were gonna come up with more of the same stuff," William says. "I think that's been a problem. Not our problem, but a problem people have with us. They don't really know where we stand sometimes. We're always moving away.
"Listen to The Velvet Underground," he offers. "No way were they a noisy, aggressive, feedback band. They did that, but they were also capable of incredibly beautiful, intimate acoustic songs and that was part of what made them so great. And the same goes for The Beatles or the Rolling Stones and lots of other bands that I loved. They were capable of showing you more than one trick."
From a media perspective, of course, the neatest tricks are the ones most prone to disaster and mayhem. In the mid-'80s, it was hard to get more extreme and nihilistic than The Jesus and Mary Chain. Drug arrests, a tendency for gigs to degenerate into riots and a series of singles banned on grounds of obscenity or blasphemy fuelled one of the more anarchic images of the post-punk era.
How responsible were the Brothers Reid for all the violence? Were they not deliberately inciting subversion, a certain amount of kicking against the pricks, if not the actual dressing room door?
"If we were responsible, none of it would have happened," William Reid insists. "It was totally beyond our control. The music was supposed to shake things up, we weren't into actual violence. But (Creation Records impressario) Alan McGee started to encourage a lot of it, spouting on about Art Terrorism and all this bullshit..."
With the benefit of hindsight, as a British rock legend who's been beaten up and savagely shopped down again, how has William Reid viewed each subsequent wave of musical fashion in the UK? As he watched punk and neo-romanticism give way to Madchester, The New Wave of New Wave and Bristol Trip-Hop, does he tend to tremble with excitement or smirk with cynicism?
"I embrace what's good about them. Sometimes good groups come out of these movements. Like the Manchester dance thing. Out of that we got the Stone Roses and The Happy Mondays. That wasnae too bood.
"But more often than not in this country the trends are too short-lived and they really don't have any substance. It's kind of embarrassing. You don't notice it so much when you live here but I spent most of the past year in America and viewing Britain from outside is embarrassing. I'm sure you know what I mean."
Oh, we do.
The Jesus and Mary Chain tour Australia for the first time in seven years next month, kicking off in Perth on May 4. Besides the Reid brothers, the band includes long-time Australian guitarist Ben Lurie, drummed Steve Monti and bassist Lincoln Fong.
William Reid promises "a lot of old stuff" tempering their determinedly progressive streak, with every album represented over the course of a show destined to be a little more controlled and precise than the Jesus and Mary Chain of old.
"These days we're more interested in playing the songs, getting them across properly," he says, "and getting drunk. We still get drunk, but not nearly as badly."
