Dinosaur Jr - Sweep It Into Space

Five years after their 11th full-length, ‘Give a Glimpse of What Yer Not’, Dinosaur Jr have delivered its follow-up. And while ‘Sweep It Into Space’ is far from being among their best work, it is still a mostly enjoyable collection of songs. The album could perhaps have benefitted from a rougher production job than the clean one Kurt Vile and J Mascis do here. It doesn’t pull off their signature trick of marrying poppy choruses to rocky riffing anywhere near as well as it could, but the nostalgic, aching wistfulness of the band’s classic melodies is retained on ‘I Ain’t’ and ‘To Be Waiting’. Mascis still performs great solos on songs like ‘And Me’ and ‘N Say’, while the band still sound like they’re really enjoying playing together after all these years on ‘Hide Another Round’. A decent album, then. Not a great one, but one that can still hold its own against any other indie rock album released this year. There’s life in these old veterans yet.