"The depravity and the sweetness": author Paula Mejia on The Jesus and Mary Chain's Psychocandy
 

http://media1.fdncms.com/gambit/imag...069792/jmc.jpg In 1985, The Jesus and Mary Chain released its massively influential landmark debut Psychocandy, an electric shock of*rock 'n' roll and sugary sweet pop as one big feedbacking sound.

The band was lauded in the U.K. press for its irreverence and unpredictably destructive live shows, But, as Paul Mejia writes in a*new book from the 33 1/3 series, the album is "an unapologetic swooning love letter to pop music"*from a band unabashedly embracing not only the*leather-clad Hamburg-era Beatles, Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground, and Marc Bolan and David Bowie, but*'60s girl groups, bubblegum and the full spectrum of pop.

Though exhaustive research and conversation,*Mejia dives into the band's history, interviewing band members Jim and William Reid, Douglas Hart and Bobby Gillespie, as well as scene familiars and Glaswegian contemporaries, finding a band shaped as much by*Margaret Thatcher's U.K. and the realities of their neglected working class neighborhoods as it was by its deliberate*pop ambition, despite its seemingly anarchic noise.

In celebrating its 30th anniversary, the band embarked on a reunion tour, which touches New Orleans Dec. 16*at The Joy Theater.?