Their thirteenth album revisits the fuzz for a late career highlight.

While I’ve been a Dinosaur Jr. fan for nearly 40 years, my listening patterns have ebbed and flowed with the changing times. Increasingly the past few years I’ve been revisiting most of their catalog, gaining new appreciation for J. Mascis’ songwriting consistency and their consistent ability to embody everything I love about guitar based rock music, especially those delicious tones no matter what equipment and effects he uses from album to album.

In re-listening to the five post-reunion albums leading up to this release, I realized that while it may not have the massive peaks of some early work, they are more consistent than the first run, which started with the scrappy, formative self-titled debut that mashed together Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Meat Puppets and Hüsker Dü’s melding of post-hardcore noise and psychedelic rock. Green Mind (1991) was a missed opportunity to show who’s boss in the grunge landscape their original fuzzy power. Everything came together with Where You Been (1993), and Mascis closed the 90s and chapter one (and a half) of the band with the underrated Hand It Over (1997). The most recent time I saw Dinosaur Jr. live was at last year’s Austin Psych Fest, where they inexplicably played arguably their weakest album, Without a Sound (1994), which sounded even more uninspired and listless as it did 30 years previously. But even so, vast influence including practically every kid who started playing guitar after 1987 in the following decades of shoegaze, post-grunge, indie & alt rock.

After a decade break and a couple albums with J. Mascis + The Fog, the original lineup sounded triumphant on a stellar run of four albums from 2007 to 2016. Sweep It Into Space (2021) was disappointing at first, as the Kurt Vile produced album went for a more jangly pop sound along the lines of Green Mind. But it holds up on repeated listens over time as a good album.

The usually inscrutable Mascis talked about being inspired by Rick Rubin’s approach to having bands re-listen to their first album to tap into that passion and excitement. He went so far as to purchase the Mesa Boogie amp used to track the debut. While there is a refreshingly abrasive, raw quality to the guitar tones, the results have more in common with Beyond (2007) and Farm (2009) given the much improved recording techniques acquired over the decades. There are plenty of great guitar solos, but not quite so stunningly visceral and face-melting as on You’re Living All Over Me (1987) and Bug (1988).

I’m never a huge fan of Lou Barlow’s songs, and the “Blowin’ Up” single doesn’t do much for me, though opener “Several Got Away” certainly flaunts the same kind of energy the band exuded on their reunion two decades back. From there, it’s a really consistent parade of solid to great songs, hooks and riffs, from “No Friends” and “Everything at Once” through “Read the Room,” “Put it Down” and “No One’s Ready,” the better Barlow track. The soaring “Take Me With You” stood out during my first listen, bringing me back to how impressed I was with Mascis’ improved, emotive singing on Where You Been (1993). It’s impressive that he sounds even better 33 years later. The intro riff to “Gone Off” tumbles joyously like a pigpile of plushie critters out of a packed closet, something that acolytes Buffalo Tom did so well on early albums. After a half dozen listens, I’d say at least seven of the tracks are killer, and only one filler, though many critics have called “Blowin’ Up” a highlight.

There Near enthusiastically dukes it out with Give a Glimpse of What Yer Not and Farm (2009) for a place in the top half of of the Mk. 2 discography.