BBC Sessions
Connoisseurs of sludgy, guitar-driven noise-pop revere the first three Dinosaur (the first two of which were originally released without the Jr. appendage) full-lengths with all the awe duly affordedCrazy Horse,Meat Puppets,Dream Syndicate, andMy Bloody Valentine. With 8 of the 10 stripped-down songs hailing from those first 3 albums and recorded whileLou Barlowmelodically assaulted bass and Murph played drums, this disc revisits the band at their peak. As Byron Coley rhapsodizes in the sleeve notes, singer-guitarist J Mascis and band "gave voice to the previously inchoate art-soul of hardcore, imbuing their music with a range of emotion without sacrificing its impenetrable surface." Previously the province of bootlegs, these BBC sessions are rawer and more tightly wound than their album counterparts--notable on the revved "Budge" and Barlow-crooned "Does It Float." The xylophone added to the hair-flying anthem "No Bones" is a nice touch, and the two mellow songs from 1992--recorded withMike Johnson--do not suck.--Mike McGonigal