Looking from the outside, Dinosaur Jr. is an unlikely rock band. For one thing, throughout their initial rise to stardom on college rock radio in the late 1980s, the three band members despised each other. Bass player Lou Barlow, upon being unceremoniously dumped by his bandmates in 1989, referred to band leader J Mascis and drummer Murph as “sleazebag snob pigs.”
For his part, Murph had a hard time deciding which of his two fellow Dinosaurs he would most like to beat to a pulp. And through it all, the stoic, martinet Mascis simply bullied his way to a point at which Dinosaur Jr. ceased being a band and simply became his own solo project.
Happily for music fans, the three resolved their acrimony 20 years ago. They have been releasing new music and touring ever since. They are rock royalty now, still something of a niche act, but big enough to sell out a 2,000-capacity room like the Fillmore in Silver Spring, MD, as they did on Sunday night. And they are still among the loudest bands on the planet.
Dinosaur Jr., Snail Mail, and Easy Action play the Fillmore
It isn’t just the personality clashes that made Dinosaur Jr. an unlikely band. The musical tastes, mostly coming from Mascis, were all over the map. Mascis combined the classic hard rock of bands like Deep Purple and Black Sabbath with the borderline-whiny proto emo of the singer-songwriters in the early ‘70s.
He wrote songs that explored deep despair in melodic verses, which then exploded into anthemic choruses with speakers turned up to eleven. Though Mascis rejected the comparison, the link to Neil Young was impossible to ignore.
But what he was really doing, according to Barlow, was serving as something of a John the Baptist figure for Nirvana. Mascis hit the scene a few years before Kurt Cobain, but he couldn’t see the revolution through to the end.
Happily, unlike Nirvana, Mascis and Dinosaur Jr. got a second act. And they are making the most of it. On Sunday, they took fans on a tour of their 40-year journey in a no-frills, 80-minute set.
They opened with one of their oldest songs – “Severed Lips” – from their first album Dinosaur, released by Homestead in 1985. It has been a fairly common opener for them dating back to the early days, but it carries additional gravitas today.
“Severed Lips” was the song the band was playing at a small show in 1988 when Barlow, tired of Mascis’ overbearing manner, took a seat on his amp and ruined the number by creating ear-splitting feedback. It led to a physical altercation, with both Mascis and Murph walking off the stage.
Happily, on Sunday, they made it through the song with no such issues.
They followed up with “In a Jar,” a great rocker from their second album, 1987’s legendary “You’re Living All Over Me,” a high point of ’80s indie rock.
Then, as if to confirm that the internal conflicts were indeed in the past, they launched into “Garden,” from their most recent album 2021’s Sweep It Into Space. And not only is it a recent song. It is a Lou Barlow song.
Barlow has written about a million songs since being booted back in ’89, mostly with his lo-fi icon Sebadoh. In his initial run with Dinosaur, he felt overshadowed by Mascis. That was partly do to Mascis’ aloof, cold demeanor, and partly due the to awe in which Barlow held his bandmate.
Barlow, who had begun Dinosaur’s precursor Deep Wound and brought in Mascis to play drums, had a love-hate relationship with Mascis. Soon, Mascis would move to guitar and become both primary vocalist and songwriter, and Barlow receded, willing to become a supporting player.
“Garden” is a fine song, combining Barlow’s less-fussy melody with a big chorus. But the most interesting thing about hearing it live is the fact that Barlow actually introduces it.
Mascis, despite singing almost every song and playing guitar, barely says a word during a show. He stands quietly, his long lean frame and long graying hair dressed in a black tee shirt and cap. He sings and launches into one blistering guitar solo after another, but almost never acknowledges the audience. He leaves that to his bass player, who has a friendlier, almost-goofy personality.
If I heard correctly, Mascis directly addressed the audience one time. After playing “Pieces” from 2009’s Farm, he said, “All right. Thanks a lot.”
That’s a verbose as J Mascis is likely to get.
Lou got to share one other lead vocal on “Mountain Man” from the debut album, which ended in one more pulverizing solo. That matched Mascis’ classic riffs at both the beginning and end of “Grab It” and “Little Fury Things,” and especially the extended jam on “Gargoyle,” which closed the main set.
If you want to read into it, the choice of “Gargoyle” to close says a great deal about J Mascis. Building up to it, the band played their best-known college station hit, “Feel the Pain,” “Mountain Man”, and then perhaps their greatest single, “Freak Scene.”
“Freak Scene” was the equal of anything Nirvana or Meat Puppets were doing at the time. It came from Bug, the follow-up to You’re Living All Over Me, when the splinters were beginning to develop into mortal wounds. It was largely an expression of the extraordinary relationship between Mascis and Barlow, and it ends with the remarkably poignant verse…
“Sometimes I don’t thrill you
Sometimes I think I’ll kill you
Just don’t let me f**k up will you?
‘Cause when I need a friend it’s still you.”
That lyric had relevance in 1989. In 2025, it can bring tears to your eyes. Not to J Mascis’ eyes perhaps, but to those of his fans. And it would have been a great way to end the main set. But Mascis always seemed to elevate the music over personal feelings, and so the three-minute guitar master class of “Gargoyle” played the role of the closer instead.
The boys returned for a three-song encore, including their only two covers of the night. First, there was a trippy take on the Cure’s “Just Like Heaven.” Then they invited John Brannon onto the stage for a raucous version of the Stooges’ “T.V. Eye.”
Brannon, whose hardcore group Easy Action opened the show, provides a bit of rock history. His earlier band Negative Approach was a Detroit hardcore punk band in the early ‘80s heavily influenced by fellow Michigan legends, the Stooges.
He clearly relished the chance to sing one of their iconic numbers. Brannon was far more animated as guest vocalist than he appeared during Easy Action’s brief set, in which he mostly sneered at the crowd over Ron Sakowski’s bludgeoning bass runs.
Between opener and headliner, Maryland native Lindsey Jordan (“local hero,” as Barlow called her) brought her band Snail Mail to the stage for a solid 40-minute set featuring songs from her first two albums, as well as a couple very strong new tracks – “Dead End” and “Nowhere.”
Snail Mail is a more melodic band than Easy Action, and taken in tandem, they kind of replicate the idiosyncratic, unlikely glory that you get from Dinosaur Jr – perhaps the greatest combination of whiny emo and ear-bleeding guitar jams you are likely to find.
If yet get a chance to catch them, you should. Just be sure to bring ear plugs.