UNCUT Magazine: J Interview Oct 2000

[OriginalPosterLost]

The UK mag ‘Uncut’ this month features a review of More Light (positive, 4 stars out of five), a full page interview with J (in which he confirms the Watt/Berz live line-up) and All The Girls is on a free compilation CD attached to the mag.

I didn’t buy the mag, so I can’t transcribe it, but it was all positive.

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[OriginalPosterLost]

The Uncut mag just came into Canada, great to get free music with mags….althou it is one thick cd got stuck in my car player…ahhh. Anyways have not seen this article posted on the site so here we go:

Thought You Were Dead

Often credited, alongside Sonic Youth and The Pixies, as paving the way for the explosion of grunge and alt rock, he was the figure who-with his brand of simple melodies shot thru with sheer noise and feedback-made guitar solos trendy again in the late 80’s. In 84, he and bassist Barlow disbanded the hardcore punk band Deep Wound to form Dinosaur (sic) with local Amnherst, Mass drummer Murph, releasing their first album the following year.

J- We just kinda formed and made the record. That was weird. We didn’t really have a sound and couldn’t play that well, really. We knew Gerrard (from homestead records) and he put out the record and we made it for $500. So that was pretty cool. We made the record to get more gigs. It was kinda the opposite thing of trying to get signed. That wasn’t on anyones mind at the time.

Unknown to Mascis and Co, there was an East Coast band of old hippies called The Dinosaurs. One of their number was Country Joe MacDonald, who was also a lwayer in San Francisco. Their objections caused the Jr to be added by the time the excellent You’re Living All Over Me in 87.

J- You’re Living All Over Me is the peak of the original idea of the band and what we were trying to do. Our only goal was to be on SST and then we got on SST and put out the album. So thats kind of the apex of it.
After that, it all kind of starts falling apart after you realise your goal so early and then theres nothing left after that so you’re going yeah we’re still in a band but we don’t have a goal any more.

For most Dinosaur fans, the following years Bug was an even better record, building on their ability to switch without a hint of warning from tuneful punk-pop to freeform noise. By now the trio were being courted by such luminaries as Sonic Youth, but internally the band was in turmoil. Masic and Barlow were no longer on speaking terms, which led to much bitterness when the bassist was sacked. Barlow subsequently made his feelings about Mascis clear on the vitrolic Freed Pig recorded with his new outfit Sebadoh.

J- It was a long story. Lou wasn’t really contributing much. He was sort of freaked out. He thought we’d ruin his songs or something. We were just to rocking or something. He put out the 1st Sebadoh record on homestead and after that it was like the door was shut and he was doing shit just to try to fuck things up. There was a period where things were unclear and somenow he’s exaggerated that.

Mascis tried his hand at producing other bands, most famously the 1st 2 albumns by Buffalo Tom. Their 2nd record, Birdbrain, sticks out from the rest of their back catalogue because of its dark, angry, brooding sound-much influenced by the Mascis mood at the time

J- I was, I think abusing them. That was kind of my production technique (cue falsetto laugh) I wasn’t proud of myself really. I kind of got out of production. I realised it wasn’t my thing, really. I just remembered being in a really bad mood. I didn’t like producing and I just abused the band. I’d just fall asleep in the control room, stuff like that.

It wasn’t until 91 that Green Mind, the next Dinosaur Jr albumn was released. It revealed several changes. Firstly, it was on a subsidiary of Warners. Secondly the punky energy was largely replace by blissed-out moments of near-falsetto vocals reminiscent of Neil Young. Thirdly, Masic played practically everything on it.

J- Murph was really out of it at that period. It was weird so, yeah, I ended up doing most of it.

Finally landing a full-time replacement for barlow in the shape of ex-snakepit man Mike Johnson, Dinosaur Jr released 3 more quality albums for Warners in the 90’s:Where You Been in 92 Without A Sound 2 years later and Hand It over in 97, after which the band just seemed to run down

J- Yeah a lot of things seemed to point to the end. I just felt like changing something.

After a 3 year hiatus, Mascis, now 34, is back recording under the name J Mascis And The Fog with Kevin Shields of MBV/Primal Scream and Bob Polloard of GBV. Their More Light album is a great return to form. Mascis has already played a handful of acoustic shows recently showing that even without an electric six-string those trademark Dinosaur Jr sounds can still be extra loud.

J- I also just played a couple of gigs with Murph recently and Mike Watt doing old Stooges covers. As for the Fog live shows, at this moment Mike Watt is gonna be in it and George the last Dino drummer. I’ve been toying with the idea of four members, but I think we can make enuf noise with just the three.

Sorry about the length but I tried to find a web page for the mag, the seach results I got for Uncut were kinda frightening so I decided to just type it. If this has already been posted oh well…what can you do.

Allison

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[This message has been edited by bates (edited November 29, 2000).]

[OriginalPosterLost]

Thanks, Allison! Good job typing that article. It’s always such a pleasure to read J interviews. [img]http://www.freakscene.net/ubb/smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

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Quite exciting this computer magic.

[OriginalPosterLost]

Hey JP,

Glad you liked the interview, it was one of the better ones I had seen in awhile.

Allison

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