Eager to avoid the violence of earlier gigs and to give an opportunity for their songs to be heard without distortion and feedback, the band planned to perform several unannounced acoustic sets supporting Sonic Youth, but this was abandoned when the plans were leaked. Their debut album Psychocandy followed in November that year. The album fused together the Reids' two primary influences: the guitar noise of the Stooges and the Velvet Underground with the pop songwriting and melodies of the Beach Boys, The Shangri-Las and Phil Spector; In fact, the album's opening song, "Just Like Honey," borrows Hal Blaine's famous drum intro from The Ronettes 1963 classic, "Be My Baby", produced and co-written by Spector. The record received unanimously positive reviews and is now considered a landmark recording. Drummer Gillespie announced his departure from the band in October 1985, to concentrate on Primal Scream. He had recorded most of the drums on Psychocandy, with John Moore filling in when Gillespie was unavailable, eventually joining the band to replace him. John Loder also acted as a stand-in drummer when Gillespie was unavailable for live performances.
