The Jesus and Mary Chain / Upside Down: The Best Of

The Jesus And Mary Chain
Upside Down: The Best Of
(Rhino)

The extraordinary story of the Reid Brothers professionally known as The Jesus and Mary Chain can be summed up with two words: pleasure and pain.
Their notorious fusion of the death of the ‘60s (personified by Manson, Spector, Warhol, Leary and Sinclair) with blissful melodies was a unique balancing act, while the group’s perpetual inability to mentally and physically maintain that balance ensured their unique position in the pantheon.
Like all greatest hits albums, this collection of A-sides, B-sides and album tracks reflects the music industry’s insatiable urge to squeeze ten-year careers into iTunes-friendly playlists. Therefore with an almost random mishmash of tracks, the collection can’t help but be a revisionist and distorted view of the band’s lifespan. Yet somehow this freakish nightmare of a playlist works: the album successfully encapsulates the incongruous Reid Brothers’ world in a teardrop.
From the early songs that drenched the spirit of the Beach Boys in Orwellian paranoia (‘Upside Down’, ‘Never Understand’) to 1994’s mellow gold country balladeering (‘Sometimes Always’), from the baggy- dancebeats of ‘Rollercoaster’ to the anarchic bile of ‘I Hate Rock’n’Roll’, the collection never fails to entertain.
A unique concoction of adrenaline and endorphins, this is a welcome reminder that The Jesus And Mary Chain knew about the pleasure of pain.