Following soon after his 30th anniversary tour of Dinosaur Jr.’s album ‘Where You Been’ in which he played five consecutive nights at The Garage, frontman J Mascis returned for a one-man tour of his new solo album, ‘What Do We Do Now’, although he only played three songs from the tracklist during the whole set.
He started on the new album early on performing his dainty single, ‘You Don’t Understand Me’, with high and low guitar pitches against a backing rhythm guitar track. There were plenty of Dinosaur Jr. covers such as ‘Out There’, which was performed at the band’s residency at The Garage, featuring its distinct tumbling riff, Mascis applying reverb with pedal and utilising delay microphone effects. He performed a rare track from the band’s post-breakup period when he formed The Fog, playing its most pivotal release, the hopping ‘Ammaring’ with heavier pedal solos and moved onto an acoustic cover of Phoebe Bridgers’ ‘Motion Sickness’.
Following new song ‘Can’t Believe We’re Here’ and its pedal interlude, the title track of the new album, ‘What Do We Do Now’, was played on a more acoustic sounding guitar before Mascis sang ‘Get Me’ with a howling voice effect and intense, pedal-driven noise solo. The perturbed, brash strokes of ‘Heal the Star’ ended on a country-tinged noise solo with Mascis finishing his main set on Dinosaur Jr.’s ‘Alone’ from their 1997, ‘Hand it Over’.
He returned for an encore of Greg Sage and Mazzy Star covers, with the latter’s ‘Fade into You’ being particularly melodically haunting.
07/04/24: J Mascis @ EartH, London.
© Ayisha Khan.