Review for www.nomoreworkhorse.com
Showing posts with label Jim Reid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jim Reid. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 21, 2024
Tuesday, March 26, 2024
Tuesday, March 19, 2024
Sunday, April 9, 2017
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
Saturday, January 7, 2017
Jesus and Mary Chain - Munki
Unfortunately after this things go a bit pear-shaped with the trip-hop duet between Hope Sandoval and William Reid, Perfume, which probably should have been kept for a B-side. Degenerate borrows liberally from the Stooges' TV Eye. Cracking Up represents a distinct improvement, and is arguably the strongest track here. Wasted ballad Never Understood (ooh clever!) is elegantly lazy. But having SEVENTEEN tracks here is way, way too much. By the time you reach closing track I Hate Rock 'n' Roll (yes, the snotty sibling of the opening track) you can see what they mean. You'll have had to negotiate 7 minutes of the warped sounding Commercial and the pseudo sixties mysticism of Supertramp to get there. Probably one of the Jesus and Mary Chain's less essential albums.
Saturday, August 2, 2014
Tuesday, April 15, 2014
Album Review: The Jesus and Mary Chain - The Power of Negative Thinking: B-Sides & Rarities
In 2008 the Jesus and Mary Chain released a 4 CD box set of B-sides. It's wonderfully packaged in a book-like case, full of notes and photographs. You have to ask yourself though: does anybody need nearly 4 hours and over 80 tracks of this?
The answer is, of course, yes. The first CD contains early demo Up Too High, the extraordinary assault of their first single Upside Down and many, many more. The hilarious, deadpan, expletive-laden Cracked is included here, but on the other hand, there are acoustic versions of some of the Psychocandy material, for those who can't take the feedback.
The second CD is almost flawless, full of exuberantly bored tracks like Kill Surf City, Everything's Alright When You're Down and TWO versions of the Beach Boys' Surfing USA. The late 80s/early 90s covered on CD3 saw some dodgy synth & drum machine experiments, though they still found time for the triumphant Something I Can't Have.
On the final CD the preponderance of acoustic-based Primal Scream-style strums (Little Stars, New York City, Taking It Away), along with covers of the Pogues (Ghost of a Smile) and Prince (Alphabet Street) sound like a band running out of steam. However, the material remains of high quality across this hugely comprehensive collection, sure to provide months of enjoyment for the Jesus-heads amongst us.
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Album Review: The Jesus and Mary Chain - The Sound of Speed
The Sound of Speed was released in
1993 and is a second helping of Jesus and Mary Chain B-sides, or non-album
tracks, following on from Barbed Wire Kisses.
So just what we all need then. It
opens with Snakedriver, a bit like a slowed-down Ramones meets the Ronettes but
then explodes into life with Reverence.
It sounds kind of quaint now but it attracted considerable controversy
over Jim Reid’s lyrics: “I wanna die just like Jesus Christ, I wanna die on a
bed of spikes” etc. What’s overlooked is
that this noisy, abrasive single reached the upper reaches of the singles
chart. It takes a vaguely hip-hop beat
and overlays it with sheets of William Reid’s guitar, with a neat reference to
the Stooges’ I Wanna Be Your Dog.
Equally noisy is Lowlife, which is excellently described by its title.
Elseswhere, they display their sunnier, almost hippy side with the lazy strums of Why’d You Want Me and Don’t Come Down. These tracks work, but an attempt at an acoustic version of Teenage Lust is less successful, neutering the original. They turn cover versions of Guitarman, Tower of Song and Little Red Rooster into their own standard issue black holes, the gloopy version of the latter is almost unrecognisable from the original. They take a different tack with My Girl, turning in a hopelessly bored, acoustic cover.
Something I Can’t Have showcases their exuberant side, bursting from the speakers with Jim Reid making lyrics like “you’re in my house, you’re in my face, you made me hate the human race” sound triumphant over ringing guitars. Sometimes, which follows, is similarly upbeat. Later, Shimmer is more subdued, with shades of the Velvet Underground thrown in, while Penetration is a pretty awful experiment with keyboards and a dance-beat.
It’s the sound of the band branching out and trying new things (relative to their older output) so it’s pretty hit and miss, but it’s quite fun to listen to.
Monday, December 23, 2013
Album Review: The Jesus and Mary Chain - Barbed Wire Kisses
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In 1988 the Jesus and Mary Chain put out a collection of B-sides, Barbed Wire Kisses. It's an abrasive collection of brattish, guitar songs. It starts out with the raucous Beach Boys-style Kill Surf City, a perfect combination of William Reid's scratchy guitars and Jim Reid's bored vocals.
Really the rest of the album is not a lot different. Rider, and Swing have a sort of strut to them that narrowly avoids cock-rock. On the other hand, the guitars and vocals on Hit are positively guttural. They allow in a little sunshine into Don't Ever Change, with blissful guitars and a really uplifting melody, and the mood is continued on the pounding Happy Place and the acoustic, heartfelt Psycho Candy.
Sidewalking signals a gear shift as the Reid brothers stick back on their shades. It's not a particularly crafted song, just a cool-sounding one. The Beach Boys' own Surfin' USA gets 'Jesused' and Everything's Alright When You're Down makes a fair stab at being an anthem. The inclusion of debut single Upside Down is a welcome one, a blast of noise that still rattles the cages.
Some of it is (intentionally?) hilarious. Cracked features ingenius lyrics "crack Johnny crack, walk Johnny walk" which "becomes f**k Johnny f**k" and then Jim Reid just spits out "f**k! f**k! f**k!". It's a collection for those who thought Darklands was a little soft following on from Psychocandy.
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