Never Understood: The Jesus and Mary Chain

Is being a “seminal” rock band an honor or a curse? When a band’s musical influence is greater than its success, the ahead-of-their-time pioneers never seem to get their just due. Scotland’s Jesus and Mary Chain is one of those bands. Their almost-naïve marriage of sweet pop sounds and wildly overdriven guitar has influenced dozens of bands. Whole genres like noise-pop and shoegaze would not exist without them. Jim and William Reid, the band’s primary members, share their story as brothers and a band. In this work written as a dual oral history, the brothers take turns in brief or sometimes more extended monologues. It’s not conversational, however. It reads as though they recorded their portions separately and then combined them chronologically. Despite that, the brothers rarely contradict each other as their story progresses. While the band’s story follows a standard pattern—lower-class background, inspirational records, the acquisition of instruments, the first gig, etc.—nonetheless, the book is a brotherly love story that is quite palpable.