Jurassic Park!

Last night really was what gigs are all about - half an hour queueing in the freezing cold to snaffle up one of four remaining tickets for J Mascis's solo show at the Social, and what turned out to be a fucking awesome evening's entertainment.

Supporting was, according to a guy behind me in the queue, "a bloke from some band called Codeine". Yep, Chris Brokaw, another American alt-rock legend and veteran of not one but two criminally underrated bands from 90s underground rock. Drumming for Codeine he had a hand in their Frigid Stars LP, one of the most majestic articulations of misery you're ever likely to hear, and a record which paved the way for the likes of Low and Mogwai. Brokaw spent most of the 90s working with Thalia Zedek in Come, producing a couple of very fine albums along the way (1994's Don't Ask Don't Tell and 1996's Near-Life Experience) and signing the T-shirt that features on the cover of Sonic Youth's Washing Machine album.

So, there I was, exchanging glances with the man himself in a packed-out venue both before and during his acoustic set: I knew who he was, he knew I knew who he was, he knew nearly no-one else knew who he was. Which led to the slightly surreal feeling that he was directing the rendition of 'Recidivist' (from Come's 1998 album Gently Down The Stream) straight at me. Tracks from his recent LP Red Cities got an airing, as did a track he's co-written for Evan Dando's new album, but it was fairly clear the audience had only come to see one man, and it wasn't him. Why does everyone in the Social have to be so damn, well, social? His acoustic was always fighting a losing battle against the chatterers. A shame, and no 'Shoot Me First' either.

So, it was the Lord Of The Drawl everyone was there to see, J Mascis. Dinosaur Jr always were a bunch of misfits and outsiders - even within the hardcore scene from which they emerged, thanks to their apolitical slacker apathy and guitarist who could really fucking play - and J remains one of the most recognisable and idiosyncratic people in rock. He's long been considered a wizard, and now he's starting to look like one, his stoner locks becoming increasingly streaked with grey - kinda like Noodles from The Offspring if he were to be shut up in a cave with The Grateful Dead for a couple of years, with the mannerisms and speech of someone who's just been woken up from a deep sleep only to be injected with morphine. And last night he was rocking the bodywarmer look.

And he played some music too. Not an acoustic set but a solo set (so there was some serious volume), and not a load of songs from the new Fog album Free So Free but a whole slew of classic tunes from his entire career. And it was absolutely magic. We got 'Freakscene' as early as the third song, along with 'Ammaring', 'Same Day' and 'Waistin' from the first Fog album More Light and Dinosaur tracks 'Flying Cloud', 'Grab It' and 'Even You' plus 'What Else Is New?' and a brilliant 'Get Me' from my favourite album Where You Been?. 'Alone', the sprawling centrepiece of 1997's swansong Hand It Over, wrapped up the main set and after a single-song encore of 'The Wagon', the legend was gone.

Cheers to all the guys from Night With No Name and Why Can't We Just All Get Along? for a fantastic night.