Five years is a long silence for a band that once filled every gap with feedback. But Dinosaur Jr have never been in a rush, and There Near, their thirteenth studio album and sixth since reuniting in 2005, makes a persuasive case for the wait. Arriving via Jagjaguwar on 28 August, it is the messiest, most blown-out music they have made this side of the millennium.
The reason is partly mechanical. J Mascis tracked down a vintage 1970s Mesa Boogie MK 1, the same amplifier model that engineer Chris Dixon used when the band recorded their 1985 debut. I bought the same amp that Chris Dixon had when we made our first album, Mascis explains. It has a real interesting sound I have not gotten for a while. The result is a record that trades the polished sprawl of recent output for something closer to the feral immediacy of their earliest work.
Recorded at Bisquiteen Studio in Amherst over short, intense bursts across a year, There Near features the core trio of Mascis, Murph and Lou Barlow alongside Ken Mauri on piano and organ. Eleven tracks in forty-two minutes, it wastes no time getting started. Opener Several Got Away sets the tone with one of Mascis’ meanest riffs and a refrain that lodges after a single spin.
Two Voices, One Basement
Barlow contributes two tracks, and both cut deep. Blowin’ Up takes aim at the current socio-political landscape with a sharpened edge, sneering at bored edgelords and death cults over jangly chords and a shambling rhythm section. No One’s Ready is perhaps the song most in keeping with the record’s atavistic ethos, sounding like an alternate reality where Dinosaur blew up before they were Jr.
Mascis, meanwhile, leans into ambiguity. I’m not always sure what a song is about when I’m writing it, he admits. Tracks like No Friends and Read the Room pair descending basslines with flanged guitars that reveal his quiet affinity for the Cure, while Put It Down begins as a gorgeous ballad before detonating into a shower of distortion.
Back to the Start
What makes There Near compelling is not reinvention but return. Mascis effectively gave himself Rick Rubin’s famous advice: go back to your first record and recapture that sound. The MK 1 amp delivers a souped-up Fender tone, less metal than later models, and the result is a record that prizes poppy melody and immediate self-expression over grandiosity. It is less Guitar Center demo station, more half-finished basement.
The band celebrate the release with intimate New York shows with support from Thurston Moore, Mike Kinsella and Snail Mail, before heading out on a North American headline tour with Stef Chura through October and November. Australian dates follow in early 2027.
After forty years, Dinosaur Jr still sound exactly like Dinosaur Jr. On There Near, that turns out to be a very good thing.