J. Mascis :: by Brittney Bush
Bollay
Click here
for more photos of Sunday’s Dinosaur Jr. show
and a slideshow of the concert.
The last time I saw Dinosaur Jr. in concert was during their
initial
2005 reunion tour at the Showbox. It was one of the
loudest concerts I’ve attended. So I walked into Sunday’s Dino J
show at the same venue with a hankering to hear songs from
Farm, the band’s excellent new album, while wondering
whether it’s possible for J, Lou and Murph to get any louder.
After the band was through with its 75-minute set I definitely
got a healthy dose of Farm material however, I really
couldn’t tell you if Sunday was any louder than it was four years
ago. But it will say it was pretty damn loud. How loud? The roadie
was handing out earplugs to people in the front row before the band
took the stage. Murph, the drummer, also handed out earplugs
telling people “it’s going to get loud.” You know it’s going to get
loud when the drummer says so.
J Mascis played in front of a massive stack of amps (11 amplifiers
total) that towered over him and although Lou Barlow’s bass stack
(which was a mere four amps) didn’t match Mascis’ in sound output,
it did match Mascis’ gigantic tower of power in height. Dinosaur
Jr. didn’t merely turn things up to 11; they cranked it up to 99
creating a pleasurably ear-assaulting wall of sound. I make it
sound like a miserably loud experience, but it was actually quite
the opposite. I left the Showbox with ringing ears (despite wearing
earplugs and standing at the back of the room) and massive grin
because I watched three reunited rockers tear it up like they never
left the scene they helped mold in the 1990s.
The reunion thing is popular nowadays but the bands that make
music after reuniting tend to do so poorly in an attempt to
recapture their old glory. Does The Pixies’ “Bam Thwok” or Smashing
Pumpkins’ “Zeitgeist” mean much to anyone? I didn’t think so. You
see, Dinosaur Jr. is one of the few reunited 90s alt-rock bands
that is making music of equal caliber of what they produced back in
the day and Farm is easily one of the band’s best records,
which is what made Sunday’s show so enjoyable. Songs like “I Want
You To Know,” “Over It,” “Pieces” and “Plans” fit nicely alongside
older songs like “Raisins” and “Freak Scene.”
Mascis, one of Generation X’s most underrated guitar gods,
wasn’t much of a talker during the show. Instead he let his guitar
speak for him. He seamlessly shifted from crunchy to squeally to
squawky to fuzzy with Lou and Murph creating the rhythmic cage to
contain the mammoth beast that was his highly-amplified ax.
Barlow did double duty Sunday with his new project Lou Barlow
and the Missingmen playing a 45-minute set before the night’s
headliners. While Dinosaur Jr. created a Jurassic-sized sound,
Barlow and the Missingmen were more harmonious and less loud. They
had more of a pop sound as opposed to a hard rock feel and my
photographer friend Britteny Bush Bollay put it best when she
said they sounded a little like Matthew Sweet. It was definitely
unexpected.
Australian band Violent Soho was also on the bill. The
headbanging three-piece tried hard but didn’t leave much of an
impression.
Of note was the size of the crowd. I was disappointed to see
half of the Showbox closed off due to what I assumed was poor
attendance. The bar on the right side of the venue was blocked off
and there were likely fewer than 500people in attendance. That is
still a sizable crowd, but for a venue that fits more than 1,000
the show was noticeably empty. To be fair, it was a 21+ show
on Sunday so that might account for the small crowd size.
