Dinosaur Jr. - The Thunderous Melody

Noise and melody are the two words usually associated with the staggering, and in some ways shocking, musical personality of Dinosaur Jr. As for the noise, hearing one of this band's classic records or singles for the first time (the period of the trio Dinosaur–You're Living All Over Me–Bug) is, musically speaking, an experience not unlike running into a tornado. As for the melody, we can say that with Dinosaur Jr, that sometimes heart-wrenching melodic sensibility finds one of its most complete realizations in the underground sphere, winning over even those who shunned it in the name of punk, rock or metal purity and toughness.

This explosive blend of sonic grit and pop hooks comes straight from the masters of the "genre" itself, namely Husker Du, the first band to make even the purists swallow the punk/pop mix, and who in those very years were definitively giving birth to power-pop. Mascis's vocal style, now slurred, now listless, comes straight from two masters of singing "under the influence": Robert Smith and above all Neil Young, who also supplies hefty injections of folk. Barlow's bass blasts, together with the pounding riffs, fall straight out of the grooves of Motorhead and Black Sabbath. The bouts of unbelievable distorted fury come directly from Mascis and Barlow's hardcore past. The gut-wrenching, or heart-wrenching, guitar solos come from a long line of illustrious predecessors: Hendrix, Iommi, Blackmore, Frampton and so on. A whole sea of 60s and 70s guitarists. New wave supplies the underlying melancholy that wraps around everything, the introspective slant of the lyrics and the lopsided gait of the melodic structures.

As should be clear from these opening lines, then, Dinosaur Jr piled up all these countless influences, producing a rock synthesis that is at once extremely original (nothing really sounds like Dinosaur Jr), effective and enjoyable from the very first listen.

Let's bring some order to the chaos with a bit of history.

In Amherst, Massachusetts, there's really one thing above all else: the University of Massachusetts, the very UMASS immortalized in a song by the Pixies. In Amherst, life for a middle-class teenager, the son of a dentist with an older brother destined for a swift and brilliant career as a lawyer, can be tough if looks don't help and shyness keeps you grounded when it comes to the opposite sex. Music, fostered by listening to his big brother's records, thus becomes the most natural outlet for Joseph D. Mascis, known to everyone simply as J.

Our J Mascis, a long-haired, frustrated high schooler, showed up in 1982, accompanied by his father, for an audition as a drummer with a certain Scott, who had placed an ad looking for musicians interested in bands like Discharge. J convinced Scott, who plays bass, to take on his friend and schoolmate Charlie Nakajima as singer. The guitarist is already there, and he's none other than Lou Barlow, the future bassist of Dinosaur Jr. This is how Deep Wound was born, a band that, alongside some more classic and at times melodic hardcore tracks, often combined the fury of the most extreme metal of the era with parosysmal accelerations pushed to the limits of human ability. It also happens that at times the guitar is distorted to the point of becoming a thin hiss, and that the other instruments too are distorted and reduced to pure sonic chaos in what are less songs than brief, terrible fits of retching lasting just a few dozen seconds ("You're False", "Pressure", "Never Let You In", "Your Head Is In Your Crotch").

Practically without even realizing it, before or at the same time as other bands far better remembered today, like Discharge themselves, they laid the groundwork for grind. A credit that some are only now starting to acknowledge. This small band of misfits became known first locally and then across the whole state, opening for pretty much any hardcore band touring the area. They managed to record an EP titled "Martian Brain Squeeze", a self-produced cassette, and appear with two tracks on an LP compilation titled "Bands That Could Be God" (Homestead, 1984). All stuff that's worth gold to collectors today. Then they broke up. Recently, following numerous requests, the band's entire output was reissued as a single album.

Meanwhile, from behind the drums, J had at times also learned to step out front, picking up the guitar and starting to sing, in what was almost a process of breaking out of his natural shyness. To give an idea of what kind of player we're talking about, he recalls that period like this: "I played drums so I could steal everyone else's guitar. Everything I played was solos. I never played a single chord until Dinosaur. (…) Chords hurt my hands. (…) I especially hated barre chords – you know, pressing your finger across all the strings. So I'd just play solos over the songs". A lucky change of instrument, albeit one marked by a notably remarkable laziness.

At the same time, with the change of instrument and the breakup of Deep Wound, our J and his friend Lou, who switched to bass and was destined to become his "inner" enemy, finished high school, arrived at UMASS and started playing as a duo. Thus was born the core of what back then was still simply called Dinosaur. Coming from the drums, Mascis tried to recreate the instrument's wall of sound with the guitar, and found no better solution than cranking the amplifier's volume up to absurd levels: "The drums initially seemed more expressive to me. I think that's why I play so loud".

Thus was born his sonic trademark, namely the guitar's tremendously high volume, usually far louder than the other instruments, at times even drowning them out in various passages, together with that typically "guitar-heavy" (or phlegmy) sound, distorted, resonant and full, which would serve as a model for much of the generation of guitarists to come right after, destined to represent a whole style. Fuzz distortion is used extensively, as is the wah-wah. In any case, both J and Lou realize that while it's fun as a duo, it's hard to actually play that way, so they recruit drummer Emmet Murphy, who goes simply by Murph. The band is now complete.

At this point someone will wonder where the curious name Dinosaur Jr comes from. Its origin lies in some incredible legal trouble: a former member of Jefferson Airplane at one point sued the Dinosaur, claiming that name had already been used by the little-known group he'd founded in the early '70s together with other survivors of this and that band. "This fucking stoned hippy shows up and tells me his band had already used that name. Fuck you - I told him - I'll just stick a Jr on it and see what happens!". This, in perfectly laconic, blunt-to-the-point-of-rudeness style typical of the man, is J Mascis's account of how the band's definitive name came to be.

In 1984 Gerald Cosloy, another UMASS student and die-hard Deep Wound fan, had moved to New York to found his own record label called Homestead, and signed up none other than the following three names: Big Black, Sonic Youth and Dinosaur. Our three heroes were thus given the chance to record their first LP.

Dinosaur (Homestead, 1985) is immediately an iron fist in a velvet glove. Taking over the band's direction, including on the songwriting side, the guitarist-singer slowed the tempos down to a more human number of beats per minute and helped himself generously to his musical idols. The nostalgic melancholy of the opening "Forget The Swan" reveals the two main melodic reference points from which Mascis's songwriting departs: Cure (whose influence on this song is blatant) and Neil Young. The immediately following "Cats In A Bowl" breaks away from the previous track, showing that hardcore hasn't been forgotten at all either. It's pivoted in particular around the strand of the genre that at the time was developing a pop or folk sensibility - Husker Du, Replacements, Meat Puppets. The gallop of "The Leper" shows that alongside punk, hard-rock and heavy-metal foundations (a scorching six-string solo) are also part of the baggage, almost as if the band wanted to show off a different facet of its influences in every song.

Above everything, though, the guitar always ranges free, already set to a volume well above the norm (though still nothing compared to some of the levels reached on albums yet to come). "Does It Float" starts off sweet and folky, but twice carries us into a viciously violent, grind-like chorus, where Mascis hurls his unsettling question - "Why does it float?" - in inarticulate, barely intelligible screams, amid an unstoppable instrumental cacophony.

Other absolutely noteworthy moments are found in "Repulsion", which seems to sum up the trio's musical passions and personal frustrations, as well as in the sugary "Severed Lips" and "Quest".

Throughout the album, the voice is what soon becomes known as "Mascis's voice", another of his unmistakable trademarks: starting once again from Neil Young and grafting on a hefty dose of Robert Smith, what comes out is a slurred, listless singing style, at times even decidedly off-key. The lyrics, as will keep happening in the future, range across insecurities and frustrations, the romantic poetics of "the outsider" (one of the recurring themes), assorted disillusionment and a sense of abandonment.

So, if Neil Young is the lyrical-pastoral reference point for the band's music ("Repulsion", "Severed Lips" and "Quest" being the most striking examples), Cure, Bauhaus and dark-wave in general clearly represent the romantic-decadent spirit ("Forget The Swan", "Pointless", "Bulbs Of Passion"), thus forming a soft superstructure (the velvet glove), while hard-rock, metal and hardcore act as the load-bearing structure meant to sustain the songwriting with hardness, substantial arrangements and sounds that remain extremely thick throughout every song (the iron fist).

When this skeleton comes out into the open, we get the ferocious episodes, like the aforementioned "Does It Float" or the - in its hideousness - gorgeous "Mountain Man", which represents the album's trash, or rather proto-trash, peak (Motorhead, Venom). Dinosaur Jr songs, mainly Mascis's songs, are built this way, in layers. It's no accident that many tracks on Dinosaur are made up of different sections, sometimes even clashing in mood, displaying an outward complexity that's almost a mirror of these young men's inner complexity. This complexity, perhaps stemming from shyness, also shows up in their live performances, where the band shields itself behind a wall of sound at levels rarely heard before.

It's exactly this "wall of sound" aspect, already present in embryonic form on Dinosaur, that gets refined and bursts forth forcefully, together with a further leap in songwriting quality, on You're Living All Over Me (Sst, 1987), Dinosaur Jr.'s second album and one of the great masterpieces of rock of all time.

The leap forward made by the trio with this second album is truly impressive, helped also by the move to Sst, the historic independent label of Black Flag, which offered greater resources, solid experience and total creative freedom. Not only had the sound definitively become something personal and unmistakable, certainly more so than on the previous record, but the songs are truly great, each one a self-contained little gem. It's a kind of songwriting that combines instantly catchy pop hooks of disarming simplicity with the ability to be angry and tender at the same time, desperately and so "directly" rock as to leave no escape. Arrows aimed straight at the heart - that's what the songs on You're Living All Over Me are, written in a state of grace, arranged and played with a truly rare personality and spontaneity.

The sonic hurricane that opens "Little Fury Things" is immediately jarring. The listener comes out of silence only to be instantly "ruffled" by anguished screams and a whirlwind of hyper-distorted guitar, warped by the wah-wah and played at a volume loud enough to drown out everything, which suddenly cuts off and spills into a completely different pop-folk melody, instantly catchy and sweetly sung. The contrast with the intro is jaw-dropping. What on earth are these "Little Fury Things"? First a rabbit (?!) that knocks the protagonist down, who then turns into a "she" who runs away anyway, all while he keeps crawling, unable to react. There's no time to figure it out before another section of the song arrives, this time a new wave passage that grows increasingly rock-like, resolving into a melodic instrumental interlude with a seventies flavour, driven by a trilling harpsichord, before returning to the sweet folk tune. This, however, doesn't end as one might expect with some kind of chorus - which is in fact completely absent - but with a further repetition of itself, over which, out of nowhere, a guitar distortion at stratospheric volumes piles on, covering everything like lava from a volcano, voice included, and ends (in the sense of "kills") the track in a wash of feedback. All within the standard rock running time of four minutes. Incredible and shattering. A revelation.

The rest of the album is no less impressive. While the first part lets loose the harder, trashier side, with the "Kracked"-"Sludgefeast"-"The Lung" sequence, which is the apotheosis of the heavy Black Sabbath-style riff and seventies hard-rock arrangement, the more melodic second side ranges from the electric folk of "Raisans" and "Tarpit" to new wave, with yet another masterpiece of introverted simplicity in "In A Jar", driven by an extraordinarily propulsive bass, all the way to the lo-fi experimentation of "Poledo", an almost delirious collage of homemade demo tapes skillfully demagnetized and barely audible, mixed with unsettling recordings of pink noise from TV or radio static.

With this album Dinosaur Jr pursue an essentially conservative project of reclamation, grafting onto it hefty doses of "sonic" noise-making and a knack for writing melodies that are incredibly simple and effective at the same time. All of this managed to give a strong forward push to the music of their era, thanks above all to their new way of shaping sound, of building the very superstructure that wraps around the songs, of blending memorable melodies with deafening noise. Ultimately, this is the essence of rock in the fullest sense of the word, namely a popular music that feeds on itself and, like the phoenix, is reborn every time from its own ashes. Rock cannibalizes itself and produces results that are syntheses new in themselves, rebuilt in a different form, capable of being a source of fresh inspiration and of launching it in directions different from its starting points, even though those starting points remain perfectly identifiable within the new output. In this sense "You're Living All Over Me", like basically all of Dinosaur Jr's work from those years, is truly exemplary of how you make rock out of rock.

During this period, besides touring with their sonic mentors/friends Sonic Youth, the band also pays tribute to one of its main sources of inspiration by producing a 7-inch single whose A-side carries a shattering, drunken cover of "Just Like Heaven", arranged with no fewer than four guitars, a vicious chorus, a delirious solo and an utterly disorienting abrupt ending - a track that would end up as a bonus on the CD version of You're Living All Over Me. The B-side, on the other hand, is "Chunks", another remarkable cover, this time of Last Rights, a little-known hardcore band: extremely violent, grandiose and grind-like at the same time.

The covers of these records deserve a separate mention: melted, fused, burnt or barely in focus, meant to represent the fusion of styles and the emotional magma from which the works they contain spring forth. The videos too are blurry, out of focus, extremely shaky, yet engaging and fun in their simplicity. The one for "Little Fury Things" in particular is a black-and-white gem - seeing is believing.

If You're Living All Over Me is the trio's emotional peak, within that initial trilogy of albums Bug (Sst, 1988) undoubtedly represents its formal peak. Everything runs at full throttle like a perfectly oiled engine, and the sonic outbursts grafted onto superb songwriting are about as good as so-called indie-rock could offer at that moment. From yet another noisy pop masterpiece in the opener "Freak Scene", which pairs incredible melodic simplicity with exuberant guitar urgency, we move to the noir romanticism of "No Bones" or the slowed-down pianistic ending of the galloping "They Always Come", to the bare, sweet folk of "Let It Ride" and "Pond Song", to the near slow-core of "The Budge", to the inevitable trash delirium of the closing "Don't", whose lyrics – exemplary of the band's "outsider" poetics – scream, endlessly and with cavernous, distorted voice, nothing but the terrible question: "Why don't you like me?", which deserves pride of place both on the album and in the band's output of this kind.

Mascis's guitar reaches unrepeatable heights of both quality and volume. There are overwhelming solos ("Freak Scene", "Yeah We Know") and moments where literally everything vanishes beneath an indeterminate number of guitars boiling over at almost inaudible peak levels ("No Bones", "Don't"). Yet beneath this sonic storm, the melodies are simple and splendid, romantic and fierce, jewels of pure compositional talent. The melody-plus-noise recipe is cooked to perfection on Bug, just as it was on the previous album.

Critics welcome the album with great enthusiasm, as does the "college radio" audience that forms the core of what will come to be called the "X-Generation", and which will make the fortune of the rock that will return to dominate the charts at the turn of the new decade. It's a type of rock that incorporates the thousand tributaries of its origins we've already discussed, by now perfectly blended, but in such a personal way that it can only become a source of new ideas with extreme care, on pain of all-too-obvious imitation by those who follow. Are we perhaps looking at one of those "dead branches" of rock that represent both a peak and a final terminus, beyond which there is only sky? You're Living All Over Me and Bug are indeed a peak, but they were also, for anyone who loved this kind of red-blooded rock and played an instrument, an incredible inspiration – not just as a sound, but as a spirit, as an example of what could be done with one's own creative freedom. They are decisive works in the definition of a new sound that within a few years would explode into the phenomenon that some clever critic, in a mood for oversimplification, would call "grunge" – that is, "crumpled" – a unifying adjective that, while a poor fit for the genuinely diverse genres played by the bands lazily lumped into that category, fits the sound of the pioneering Dinosaur Jr perfectly.

Nirvana themselves undoubtedly owe a great deal to the Dinosaur sound. But the so-called shoegaze movement also has something of a debt to the guitar work of the Amherst trio. A figure like Kevin Shields, for instance, doesn't deny his love for these records and for Mascis's work, and he will acknowledge their influence in shaping the sound of My Bloody Valentine's masterpieces "Isn't Anything" and "Loveless". The two are great friends and make no secret of their mutual admiration.

The relationship with Sonic Youth, and in particular Thurston Moore, with whom they exchange mutual influences, also goes back a long way, all the way to the Homestead days. This is a period in which even a figure like David Bowie declares that Dinosaur Jr is his favourite band, and this celebrity endorsement will soon also yield a Bowie-Mascis collaboration: a remake of "Quicksand" from "Hunky Dory", destined to end up on one of the many Dinosaur Jr singles or EPs.

All this success and admiration – always, it should be clear, at an underground level – obviously inflates the already sizeable ego of the band's leader and creates strong tensions within the group, especially with his now-former friend Lou Barlow, who feels his creativity stifled by the extremely limited space left to him. In short, the two had stopped being able to stand each other for some time.

The final act of this historic line-up will be the posthumous release of Fossils (Sst, 1991), an excellent collection of singles and b-sides recorded for the legendary label. Thoroughly recommended as a first taste of the band, it offers the chance to hear singles that were already hard to find at the time, such as the other famous cover "Show Me The Way", or great b-sides like the highly peculiar "Keep The Glove", with an exceptional sonic finale, the savage "Chunks", or again "Throw Down", an illuminating folk flash lasting a few seconds that, like a pearl, lets itself be glimpsed only for a moment before retreating back into the shell of Mascis's soul.

The final blow to the trio's by-now precarious stability comes from two events: the bassist's new interests in alternative projects with his two old friends Jason Lowenstein and Eric Gaffney, with whom he forms Sebadoh, destined to provide the new paradigm for the term lo-fi and to remain close to many hearts, as well as the move to major label Warner, and specifically to its alt-rock imprint Blanco y Negro, when Murph too lets go.

About to record the new album, his bandmates thus abandon the leader, who in 1990 finds himself alone on the eve of entering the studio. Although the timeline stretches out, nothing can stop the eclectic guitarist, not least because major-label contracts are no joke if you don't deliver what you committed to recording; drawing on his past experience as a drummer and his innate musicality, he takes his place behind every instrument, recording and producing the entire new record by himself, with only a few sporadic contributions from the loyal Murph, who stuck around long enough to record three tracks, including the single, and from Don Fleming of Gumball, with whom his partnership is fairly steady during this period.

Green Mind (Blanco y Negro, 1991) arrives after an almost three-year wait and is, in itself, a good record. Except that this means a substantial halt in Mascis's artistic growth, since having found his magic formula he simply repeats it, shifting only into a calmer gear compared to earlier work. The strong guitar impact remains, both in terms of quantity and volume, as shown by the whirling single "The Wagon", with the usual indeterminate number of guitar overdubs, already released the previous year in a different version on a 7" for Sub Pop while awaiting its final home, or again "Puke + Cry", driven by a solid, tightly rhythmic acoustic guitar.

The excellent flashes of melodic simplicity remain, like the velvety "Flying Cloud", or the sing-song "Thumb", one of the best tracks here, able to be a two-chord lullaby without ever becoming boring – quite the opposite, it draws you in. The stone-rock of "I Live For That Look" and of "Green Mind", like other tracks on the record, can only be appreciated for how it comes out treated by Mascis's prize-winning centrifuge.

Having said that the overall level remains high, there's something that doesn't fully convince. The rough edges have been sanded down considerably, the vocals never give themselves over to tormented screams, and the noise feels more "obligatory" than "felt". The punk, metal and new-wave influences are pushed into a corner, while those of classic rock take over. For instance, one can't help sighing at the thought of how the excellent "Water" would have been handled in earlier times. The paroxysmal outbursts of a "Mountain Man", a "Chunks" or a "Don't", where buckets of musical colour hurled with fury splashed across the staff, are now water under the bridge. The very fact that the average track length and the album's overall running time go back up, after the leaner numbers of the two previous records, is, all things considered, more a sign of less rigorous "selection" than of an abundance of genuinely strong material.

The point is that the absolute creative control Mascis now enjoys is used to settle on the level already reached rather than venture any further. Partly it's the major-label effect, which makes everything glossier and less "unusual"; partly – as he himself states in interviews from the period – it's simply what the frontman likes: standard rock, played with the guitar cranked all the way up. Almost like a teenager in his bedroom, letting off the day's frustrations by picking up his trusty six-string, turning the volume knob all the way up, and jamming along with his favourite records.

Mascis also gets a certain reward in sales, even if lower than hoped. He nevertheless states that he can finally live off his music alone and is no longer forced to hold down a "normal" job too, which is why he doesn't understand the others who abandoned him. For the first time, the name Dinosaur Jr becomes known to a segment of the mainstream audience not used to frequenting import record shops.

Between tours, Mascis records new songs and churns out EPs, continuing to work with Don Fleming, who also puts pen to paper on some compositions, so that for a while he can effectively be considered a new member of the band. In fact, it could be said that some of the best material from this period ends up precisely on EPs or as b-sides, which, as already mentioned, have always been excellent even in the past. Just think of the thoroughly rock-solid, decidedly old-school "Whatever's Cool With Me", or the delicate "Sideways", perfectly suited to a foggy day, both inexplicably left off the LPs.

Murph returns to the fold, Mike Johnson is recruited as the new full-time bassist, and a minimum of “collegiality” is thus restored — more on a formal level, especially for photos and interviews, than in any real sense. The band churns out a few good songs that bode well for the future. Tension rises in particular with the release of the excellent single “Get Me,” which heralds the new album. The track is the classic dinosaur-style example of a song born acoustic but played electrically, sweet just enough, with a catchy little chorus hook. The 45 also boasts a decent b-side, even if it's yet another cover — this time of “Hot Burrito # 2” by the Flying Burrito Brothers, which nonetheless surprises with its freshness.

Instead, what happens is that Where You Been (Blanco y Negro, 1993) disappoints, at least in part. Sure, there are flashes of brilliance, like that first single, or the album-opening bomb “Out There,” the second single, with imposing guitar walls and driving solos, and the gem “Goin Home.” Still, the new record remains on the same noisy-rock plane as Green Mind, without any substantial change. The adventurous spirit, the thrill of having discovered a new vein, is by now long gone, and repetition compulsion is never a good thing. There are classical orchestrations, even the use of grandiose timpani on “What Else Is New” and “Not The Same,” and attempts to redo Neil Young better than Neil Young himself, again on “Not The Same.”

It's not that the individual songs are unlikeable, but some are stretched out too long, like “Start Choppin'” or “What Else Is New,” while others resemble each other a bit too closely, like “Drawering,” which is decidedly a watered-down copy of “Get Me,” just arranged with tubular bells. Even the recurring off-key vocals now seem more like an affectation.

In conclusion, the various tricks never really break through, and what we're left with is essentially a product stamped from the previous album's mold — decidedly “formulaic,” even if it's the Dinosaur Jr. brand of formula.

Left on his own, Mascis's problem isn't so much wanting to overdo it (since he was already more sonically overflowing before), but rather no longer having anyone to tell him when it's time to stop and try another path — maybe a rockier one, but more rewarding; he's no longer held in check by certain, let's call them “alternative,” sensibilities that were above all Barlow's own, who indeed throughout his entire career always had the innate ability (or should we say innate bad luck?) to flee from anything that even remotely smelled of commercial success the moment it got close.

The same script repeats itself with the following Without A Sound (Blanco y Negro, 1994), yet another by-the-numbers effort good enough to scrape a passing grade, and with the last full-length to come out under the dinosaur brand, Hand It Over (Blanco y Negro, 1997), neither of which adds or takes away anything from the story, merely stretching things out.

By now everyone knows exactly what to expect from an album by the band, and that's precisely what shows up. The name Dinosaur Jr has for years been the private business of the guitarist alone, and little by little everything has been reduced to “J Mascis doing Dinosaur Jr.” He realizes this and finally puts an end to the story, beginning to work as a solo artist in name as well as in fact.

In the long run, over the course of the '90s it's Barlow who achieves the best artistic results, acknowledged by critics and the more discerning audience, with the lo-fi, folk, punk, experimental pot-pourri of Sebadoh. Yet he too, with his idiosyncratic — one can't say how deliberate — aversion to success, ends up losing himself in a myriad of musical projects (among others Sentridoh, Folk Implosion), wrapping himself up in his own dreams and eventually losing his way, musically and personally alike.

Just as, by the new millennium, word has it that Barlow is literally struggling to get by, reduced to offering himself online to the highest bidder to write songs on commission, the unthinkable happens. A classic bolt from the blue. In 2005 the historic Dinosaur Jr lineup reunites and embarks on a world tour.

Matching the great enthusiasm expressed by the three, albeit hedged with endless “let's see what happens” caveats, there is indeed a great live act: incendiary and romantic, naturally very loud as befits them, but extremely sharp in revisiting the magnificent repertoire the three recorded together back in the day. Whoever sees them — and there are many, proof of the band's huge legacy — certainly doesn't leave disappointed. Whoever doesn't see them doesn't know what they're missing. The three hold nothing back, the three are alive and full of energy. Incredible to say, after fifteen years apart.

Maybe it's age, but the rough edges between J Mascis and Lou Barlow have been smoothed over, while Murph was never really in question alongside the leader.

Once the world tour is done, the trio states: “The idea was just to do a tour, but we got along so well that we said to ourselves, why not?” So they even go on to record a new album by the “real” Dinosaur Jr., titled Beyond (Fat Possum, 2007).

Although critics receive it quite warmly, this writer believes the record doesn't fully live up to the excellent promise shown live. The usual good moments aren't lacking (Barlow's “Back To Your Heart” is the best of the bunch, but “We're Not Alone,” the acoustic “I Got Lost” and the thumping “Lightning Bulb” also satisfy), yet the album sounds more in line with Dinosaur Jr. from when that was simply J Mascis's stage name, rather than like the full-throttle return of the historic Amherst trio.

Let's be clear, obviously in this whole story there's been nothing “shameful” or “terrible” about the name; its dignity has always remained intact. It's just that, coming from the three who produced the string of gems Dinosaur–You're Living All Over Me–Bug, who churned out a series of songs capable of branding themselves onto a generation's soul on first listen thanks to their exuberant spontaneity, who had an enormous influence on rock both contemporary and afterward, you really do always expect the best. Expectations too high after more than fifteen years? Maybe, but there's still a sickly-sweet aftertaste. In other words, you can't shake the impression that Beyond could have been better than it actually turned out to be.

With Farm (2009), though, the scents of Dinosaur Jr's old magic come pleasantly wafting back. From the lively, flowing drive of the opener “Pieces,” a perfect modern synthesis of the band's old new wave streak, to the deeply inspired melody of “Plans,” aching and noisy, with one of those solos only J Mascis can pull off, to Barlow's reliably excellent contribution on “Your Weather,” which represents the album's darker, more “off-to-the-side” folk flank, we find again the aura we thought lost and the strength we thought spent. Melody & noise, just like the old days.

If "Friends", "No Here" and "I Don’t Wanna Go There", with another torrential guitar solo, seem to have been lifted straight out of the Seventies and dropped into 2009, "Said The People" reminds us that Dinosaur Jr are still capable of excellent performances of unexpected tenderness. Barlow also gives us another of his fine songs: the closing "Imagination Blind".

Above all, one thing really signals how much confidence and self-assurance Dinosaur Jr – and above all Mascis – have regained: that absurdly loud guitar volume is finally back, especially in the solos, where it rises up to drown out every other instrument. That trademark which made this bunch of hotheads, who wrote a chapter of rock history, instantly recognizable.

Three years later, in mid-September, record stores saw the release of the third post-reunion album, I Bet On Sky (Jagjaguwar, 2012), which confirms the American trio's state of grace. The usual guitar intros, and the equally characteristic closing solos (the first single "Watch The Corners", and later "Almost Fare"), launch the album in style, with Mascis's halting, lazy yet utterly unmistakable voice rounding out what has been a genuine trademark for almost three decades now.

Keep an ear out for the rock feeling of "Pierce In The Morning Rain", which stands out in a set of tracks leaning toward the melodic-melancholic (exemplified by "Stick A Toe In"), and for the usual homage to Neil Young (the closing "See It On Your Side"). But unexpectedly, one of the tracklist's peaks is Barlow's "Recognition" (he also writes the upbeat "Rude", placed midway through the selection), a confession that sounds like a claim for vindication from the bassist, who centers the lyrics on his own desire to be reassessed after Mascis showed him the door in the wake of "Bug". A remarkably revealing song that explains how J and Lou came back to work together, with mutual respect.

I Bet On Sky is a record built more on craft than on inspiration, but that's never necessarily a bad thing – certainly not when the craftsmen in question are Dinosaur Jr., once again proving that a long career doesn't necessarily have to drag along any pathetic baggage.

And if, listening to the ten new tracks, you find yourself drifting back in time to the sound of "Freak Scene" and "Out There", that should be read as proof of stylistic staying power rather than self-plagiarizing inertia. A thousand times better to have Dinosaur Jr. sounding like themselves yet again than chasing, in some forced and ridiculous way, the trends of the moment. Can you really picture J, Lou and Murph fiddling about with drone-rock monochords, or diving into the latest frontiers of alt-electronic? Let's keep them just as they are – it suits us better that way.

In August 2016 came the fourth album since the astral reunion of J Mascis and Lou Barlow, Give A Glimpse Of What yer Not, which crystallizes the style consolidated over the years and the band's absolute refusal to bring in any new element. The album serves up the same ingredients as the recent past, while still confirming the American band's consistently excellent health, unbeatable at delivering their own well-known mix of distortion and melody. Huge electric power and catchiness, in the best tradition of Mr. Mascis, the main protagonist behind the huge riffs of "Goin Down" and "Tiny", the melancholic alt-rock curves of "Lost All Day", and the solos of a seasoned guitar hero (in unmistakable Neil Young style) that adorn every track.

The choruses are all spot-on (try listening to "I Told Everyone"), "Good To Know" is the track that can still make you feel like the center of the world (the way "State Of Love And Trust" or "Once" once did), and a couple of (fake, since they take off along the way) ballads, "Be A Part" and "Knocked Around" (sung almost entirely in falsetto), break up the pace, giving the record some dynamic range. Lou Barlow contributes his usual two excellent tracks, this time "Love Is..." and "Left / Right", perfect for making up for "Brace The Wave", his underwhelming solo record from the previous year.

The sound of Dinosaur Jr has become a "classic", and it's hard today to say whether these gentlemen can still be filed under alternative rock. What's certain is that they never betray expectations, continuing to make exactly the records we'd expect from them. A bit like a good wine, which keeps its character intact even as it ages.

Delayed by about a year because of Covid-19 and released by the ever-reliable Jagjaguwar, Sweep It Into Space (2021) is the trio's twelfth album. Not that expectations for them are ever low, but this time they were especially high, thanks to the announced involvement of Kurt Vile, who partly produced the record and played a number of guitar parts on it. The premise was particularly enticing, not just because of Vile's undoubted talent – another contemporary guitar giant, though less seasoned – but also because of his stylistic debt to the band, and to Mascis in particular.

The disappointment, if we can call it that, that the record carries with it has to do precisely with the contribution of the Philly guitarist, which fails to leave much of a mark. Indeed, aside from the finishing touches on the single "I Ran Away" and the looser-than-usual pace typical of Vile's slacker vibe, his presence ends up feeling rather intangible.

This time it's Barlow who takes on the role of main lyricist, writing almost all of the words, and also singing the one belonging to the album's most beautiful song. "The Garden" overflows with melancholy, carried by a chorus that's both sweeping and light, recalling the wonders of "Green Mind".

Compared to other albums from Dinosaur Jr.'s post-reunion past, this latest one is perhaps the gentlest and most whispered, with melodic impact taking precedence over guitar onslaughts. A baseline dose of Mascis-style fireworks still can't be missing though, and so "I Met The Stones" delivers almost metal-like blows, while "I Expect It Always" skids and shifts gears like a rally car.

Aside from the aforementioned "Garden", a track of truly immediate, crystal-clear beauty, the record doesn't live on dazzling moments, preferring instead to flow along with steady pleasantness. The band's one-of-a-kind, nearly unrepeatable formula certainly helps keep listeners' ears pricked up with every release, but it must be said that these three old freaks from Amherst, even when, as this time, they don't take too many risks, always bring the result home.

Although they are exactly the same lineup as at the start – the historic, legendary trio of Mascis-Barlow-Murph – the post-reunion (2007) Dinosaur Jr. have never sounded exactly as they did during the 1985-1988 phase, the one that preceded Lou's departure from the group and produced the blistering trilogy "Dinosaur"/"You're Living All Over Me"/"Bug". The new dinosaurs, perhaps because they're more mature and measured, sounded less abrasive than before, more inclined toward expansiveness, dreamy atmospheres, and the occasional psychedelic streak. Still, they proved capable of magical records like "Farm" and, to a lesser extent, "I Bet On Sky".

The approach changes radically with There Near (2026), for which Mascis says he gave himself the same advice Rick Rubin gives the bands he produces: sit down, listen back to your first record, and return to that sound.

Not only did J revisit the first album, he also got his hands on a 1970s Mesa/Boogie Mark I (MK I), the legendary amp that gave 1985's “Dinosaur” its raw, aggressive, flayed-alive sound. The result is, paradoxically, a breath of fresh air.

Where the still-solid “Give A Glimpse Of What Yer Not” and “Sweep It Into Space” skirted formula and exposed the limits of the band's newer approach, “There Near” draws its strength from a once-again direct approach and less convoluted songwriting.

What the excellent lead single “Several Got Away” promises is delivered across the whole tracklist, whether it leans into melancholy melodies (“No Friends”, “Everything At Once”), lets loose with thrilling, lopsided guitar-hero moments (“Take Me With You”), or zeroes in on structure and detail (“Read The Room”) — it all combs the listener's hair just right.

And then there's “Put It Down”, where Mascis's Fender sounds closer than ever to that of his undisputed idol Neil Young. If Mascis, with his torrents of words about friendship, escapism and isolation, supplies the heart and poetry of “There Near”, Barlow's usual quota handles politics, with two tracks steeped in abrasive folk rock (“Blowin' Up” and, especially, “No One's Ready”) that tackle the futility of war and the normalization of violence.

Along with the old amp, Dinosaur Jr. also seem to have recovered their urgency, on a thirteenth album that may not contain songs destined to go down in history like those of the Eighties, but that surprises with its grit and immediacy, and promises deafening live shows.

Contributions by Claudio Lancia (“I Bet On Sky”, “Give A Glimpse Of What Yer Not”), Michele Corrado (“Sweep It Into Space”, “There Near”)

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