Dinosaur Jr.

Murph, Mascis and Barlow

Dinosaur Jr. is an Alternative Rock band from Amherst, Massachusetts that started in 1984, with the following members:

• J Mascis, guitars, lead vocals, drums, various other instruments
• Lou Barlow, bass and backing vocals
• Murph, drummer.

They've experienced some lineup instability - Barlow was kicked out in 1989 and Murph in 1991, reducing the band to "J Mascis + other dudes". Mascis eventually retired the name in 1997, but the original lineup got back together in 2005 and has recorded two more albums.

Influenced by hardcore punk, metal, classic rock and alt rock, they tend to veer all over the musical spectrum, both in genre and on Mohs Scale of Rock and Metal Hardness.

Discography:

• Dinosaur (1985)
• You're Living All Over Me (1987)
• Bug (1988)
• Green Mind (1991)
• Where You Been (1993)
• Without a Sound (1994)
• Hand It Over (1997)
• Beyond (2007)
• Farm (2009)

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Dinosaur Jr. provides examples of the following tropes:

• Air Guitar: One of the leading causes amongst indie rock fans.
• Chorus-Only Song: After a manner of speaking. "Don't" consists of five and a half minutes of noise rock and Lou Barlow screaming, "Why don't you like me?!" until he coughed up blood.
  • Also counts as Careful with That Axe.
• Control Freak: Mascis in The Eighties, to the point that he forced Murph to play the drum parts he created himself and limited Barlow's contributions (You're Living All Over Me had only two of his songs, which got to reduced to one song with vocals on Bug).
  • Though it seems like this is at least partially due to Barlow's perception of Mascis; later interviews show Mascis had the unspoken expectation that Barlow would contribute more, whereas Barlow felt that Mascis was the band and channeled all of his songwriting into Sebadoh.
• Epic Instrumental Opener: "The Lung".
• Epic Rocking: "Plans", "Said the People", "I Don't Wanna Go There" and "Alone". Basically, the album Farm. Although "Alone" is actually on Hand It Over.
• Fake-Out Fade-Out: On "Don't". Kind of.
  • Also, "We're Not Alone."
• I Am the Band: On Mascis' part, which basically caused the breakup of the original group.
• Loud of War: Their standard practice in live shows.
• Lyrical Dissonance: A trademark of J Mascis. The band is well known for singing slacker lyrics while rocking faces off.
• Melody: Especially since the original lineup reunited, they've taken a turn for the melodic.
• Metal Scream: Lou Barlow is surprisingly good at this. See "Just Like Heaven" and "Don't" (as previously noted, he coughed blood after they recorded it).
• Neoclassical Punk Zydeco Rockabilly: Indie hardcore metal classic noise rock.
• New Sound Album: To some extent, the albums after 1989, when Lou Barlow got fired.
• Non-Appearing Title: "Lightning Bulb" and "Raisans".
• Perishing Alt Rock Voice
• Self-Titled Album: Dinosaur, before they were forced to change their name.
• Start My Own: After Barlow was fired from the band, he formed the influential indie rock band Sebadoh.
• Writing Around Trademarks: They were originally called Dinosaur, but got sued by a supergroup called The Dinosaurs and added a "Jr." to the title.