LIVE: The Jesus & Mary Chain – Liverpool Student Guild 16.02.15

The crowd gathers in Liverpool’s Student Guild, eagerly anticipating the gig that coincides with the 30-year anniversary of iconic noise-pop album, Psychocandy. We are told by singer Jim Reid that they will be playing two sets, with what would traditionally be the encore coming first. The ‘encore’ begins with a note-for-note rendition of ‘April Skies’ from 1987’s Darklands, a perfectly crafted pop album that, while perhaps still too harsh to be truly considered so, is far less abrasive than its precursor. The expected blanket of guitar fuzz is present, yet the atmosphere at this point is tame, ice un-broken. This air prevails until the sultry ‘Reverence’, to which the crowd finally succumbs. It is a pivotal moment; smoke erupting to wailing guitar feedback which partially drowns out Reid’s nonchalant utterances of “I wanna die just like JFK”. The first set ends, guitar left on-stage to howl in an appropriate fashion.

After a short break the unmistakeable, reverb-drenched drums of ‘Just Like Honey’ announce the start of the album’s full-length recital. The band remain unwaveringly loyal to both song structure and tone throughout (think pure pop, cloaked by a wall of noise and backed by relentless beats), while projected images of black and white glaring eyes and splattered colours capture the mood perfectly. Distortion wails on through the obscured euphoria of ‘The Hardest Walk’ until the arrival of ‘Cut Dead’, which offers a moment of subtlety with its sway-worthy tempo and comparatively subdued guitars.

It is this brief, contemplative interval that makes the second half all the more potent; the screech of feedback returning with vigour on ‘You Trip Me Up’, cave drums inducing an almost trance-like state among the spectators. The band then closes with ‘It’s So Hard’, which glares and drones on in an almost seductive fashion despite the fact that this is perhaps one of the harshest tracks so far. Despite the ringing ears and dazed brains, I leave content having just witnessed the faithful rendering of a legendary album.

Luke Savage