There are albums you admire, albums you respect, and then there’s the one that feels like it was written into your DNA. For me, that record is Psychocandy. Four decades on from its release, I can still remember the first time I heard it properly, how it felt like stepping into a storm where the noise was so overwhelming that melody only revealed itself if you stood still long enough. It wasn’t just a collection of songs, it was a revelation, and it has stayed my all-time favourite record ever since.
This 40th anniversary edition from Third Man Records isn’t just a reissue, it’s a reminder of why this album matters so much. Spread across two LPs cut at 45 RPM, Psychocandy is sharper and more unrelenting than ever. The distortion hasn’t been polished away; it’s been magnified. Play it loud on speakers and the room vibrates like it might collapse under the weight of feedback. Put it on headphones and every scrape, hiss, and collision of sound becomes part of a deliberate architecture. Just Like Honey is as fragile and eternal as ever, its heartbeat-drum opening still capable of making time stand still, while The Living End snarls with the kind of sneering nihilism that most bands can only dream of capturing.
The Detroit live recording from 1987 is a gift. It’s easy to forget that The Jesus And Mary Chain were notorious live, walking the line between chaos and collapse, but this set nails the atmosphere perfectly. The songs bleed together, battered by feedback, the band sounding half on the brink of self-destruction and half untouchable. It’s not a clean listen, nor should it be. It captures that dangerous energy, the feeling that everything could fall apart at any moment—that made them such a volatile and vital band.
Then there’s the 7”. A metallic gold artefact containing the earliest demo of Just Like Honey backed with Jesus Fuck. The demo is scratchier, unfinished, but the bones of perfection are already visible. Hearing it is like peering into the workshop of chaos where beauty and noise first collided. Jesus Fuck, meanwhile, is pure abrasion: nasty, confrontational, a reminder that this band weren’t trying to please anyone. It’s the perfect counterweight to the sweetness lurking inside their pop instincts.
What makes Psychocandy so enduring is that it shouldn’t work. On paper, this clash of sugary pop melodies with walls of feedback should cancel each other out. Instead, the tension creates something entirely unique, a kind of dark alchemy where noise becomes beauty and beauty becomes noise. So many bands have tried to replicate that trick in the years since, but no one has ever really nailed it in the same way. This isn’t influence you can copy, it’s lightning in a bottle.
Listening to this new edition reminded me why the album has never shifted from its place at the very top for me. I’ve lived with it through different stages of my life: blasting from cheap speakers in my teens, turned up too loud in the car with the windows down, dissected on headphones when I wanted to hear the detail hidden under the chaos. Each time, it feels new again, like there are still shadows I hadn’t noticed before.
The 40th anniversary package gives fans the best of both worlds: a beautifully cut version of the album that amplifies everything that made it revolutionary, plus the raw, dangerous energy of the live set, and the thrill of hearing the seeds of it all on that gold 7”. It’s not just a reissue, it’s a reminder of how one record can still feel like a secret whispered directly into your ear, even after forty years.
This isn’t just my favourite album of all time; it’s the record that set the benchmark for how music could make me feel. If you’ve never heard it, this edition is the definitive way in. If you already love it, this is the celebration it deserves.
This is and always will be 10/10.
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