In Sludge We Trust
When Dinosaur Jr began, guitar-soloin' frontman J Mascis had the idea for their sound in mind: "ear-bleeding country." On their second album, 1987's You're Living All Over Me, he got the first part right. The record was Mascis' veritable assault on the fretboard; every track lashed in layers of electric guitar, pushed up so loud in the mix it distorts not via an effects pedal, but by being so far in-the-red.
The end of "Tarpit," for one, culminates in a massed tangle of sheer dissonance, walls of squalling feedback and washes of white noise building into a sonic maelstrom. In the narrative of alternative rock, this made Dinosaur Jr peers of New York art-rock hipsters Sonic Youth (whose atonalist guitarist Lee Ranaldo produced You're Living All Over Me), a source of inspiration for future shoegaze kingpins My Bloody Valentine, and a band at the frontlines of grunge's nascent uprising.
Though their Massachusetts upbringing usually leaves them out of grunge discussions, Dinosaur Jr were obvious forerunners of the movement. Having started out in a hardcore outfit called Deep Wound as teenagers, Mascis and bassist Lou Barlow were into aggressive, distorted playing, but their true loves weren't punk bands, but classic-rock icons like Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Black Sabbath, and Led Zeppelin. They just wrung those influences through thick and fuzzy, halfway nasty songs. Hell, there's a cut here called "Sludgefeast," which sounds like grunge's motto.
You're Soloing All Over Me
What has forever defined Dinosaur Jr is the way that, underneath the massed guitar-noise, lurk pop-songs. Or, in Mascis's estimation, country tunes. Singing in his trademark drawl, Mascis hits an unexpected emotional register; his crooked, croaky croon wavering in a way that makes the largely-unemotional singer sound as if he's delivering tender emotions (even in "Sludgefeast"). The contrast to him is Barlow, the brooding, bratty bassist whose screams find him wearing his heart on his sleeve.
After being unceremoniously dumped from Dinosaur Jr by 1989, Barlow would go on to find fame as Sebadoh, which began as a home-recording project matching bruised ballads to unhinged, angst-riddled rock. Here, with You're Living All Over Me coming to a close, Barlow switches from the wailing hardcore of "Lose" to the entirely-unexpected "Poledo," a six-minute tape collage mixing ultra lo-fi confessional with transient random noise bursts.
It's an odd inclusion on the record, but it gives it an overarching sense of narrative. "Little Fury Things" begins things with a wash of overdriven, saturated noise-rock; a blast that serves as an opening salvo, a veritable assault on the senses. 36 minutes later, with Mascis's fretboard already flayed to within an inch of its life, things peter out sadly. It turns You're Living All Over Me into an almost-narrative; carves out an emotional arc that gives the LP a familiar trajectory each time you listen.
Record Label: SST (later reissued on Merge)
Release Date: 14 December 1987
