Jesus and Mary Chain frontman Jim Reid and his brother, guitarist William Reid, played at the Palace Theatre Tuesday night. (Photo by Steven Cohen, special to the Star Tribune)
They couldn't get much right their last time in town, but this time the members of the Jesus and Mary Chain didn't even let a disruptive curtain call and fire alarm derail their performance at the Palace Theatre.
Opening their U.S. tour in St. Paul on Tuesday behind their first new album in nine years, the Scottish rockers – brothers William and Jim Reid with three recently added members – were nearing the end of their surprisingly hiccup-free set when the newly refurbished theater's fire curtain suddenly dropped in front of them mid-song. Alarm lights near the exits also started flashing.
According to production staff, the alarm system was set off by the heavy smoke the band had been pumping onto the stage to match the reverberating roar of their stormy pre-encore finale "Reverence." Hey, now we know the theater's safety features are in excellent working condition. After almost a 10-minute lull – in which the nearest thing to panic was fans worrying they wouldn't get to hear "Just Like Honey" (saved for the encore) -- the band nonchalantly returned to the stage and got right back to it.
"We talked about it and decided to just do this again," lanky singer Jim Reid said as they restarted "Reverence" (or Reid said something to that effect, anyway; that Scotsman accent is rather thick).
What a sharp contrast Tuesday's show was to the band's prior local gig at First Ave in 2012, when the Reids and their crew also restarted several songs, but that was because they kept mucking them up. That was such a half-ass performance, it probably explained at least in part why the Palace audience was only about half-full. The JAMC has always had a spotty live reputation locally, though, going back to its 20-some-minute debut at First Ave in 1985.
This time, the band members not only rolled through the old classics with decent verve and without any trouble – including "April Skies," "Head On" and "Blues From a Gun" early in the set and, yep, "Just Like Honey" near the end – they also made an excellent case for the new LP, "Damage and Joy."
The show kicked off spiritedly with the catchy new gem "Amputation," and the post-alarm encore ended with another new one, the slow-building, snarly "War on Peace." Midway through the set, the band unfurled the highlight of the new album and one of the best numbers in the show, a pitter-patty rhythmic and coolly aloof blaster called "All Things Pass." That song alone made Tuesday's set surpass the entire 2012 debacle.
