For seven nights in New York’s Bowery Ballroom, Dinosaur Jr. had several guest musicians line the stage for some of his performances. This week it was Kurt Vile, Jeff Tweedy, Henry Rollins, and Bob Mould. But last night was very entertaining with guest comedian Eugene Mirman, former Minutemen bassist Mike Watt, Sharon Van Etten, and Kevin Shields, the semi-reclusive My Bloody Valentine frontman. Mike Watt played alongside Dinosaur Jr. for the covers of “Fun House” and “T.V. Eye” from the band Stooges, Sharon Van Etten went on to sing “Freak Scene,” one of Dinosaur Jr.’s songs, and then Kevin Shields joined for the cover of My Bloody Valentine’s “Thorn” and then a final wrapup with Kurt Vile with “Cortez The Killer,” written by Neil Young, in an ten minute encore finale.
In the multiple fan videos that are taken, there are screams and shouts from the audience as the guests come rolling out one by one. It is amazing to see the astonished faces, but then again the performances are brilliant. Sharon’s collaborating front with Dinosaur Jr.’s song is possibly impressive seeing that it works out with her tone of voice being a bit mellow for the right scene. Kevin Shields performance is impressive for being able to perform almost in sync with the song from My Bloody Valentine, but adjusting it for the covered version. However, the encore performance was interesting to see with the way that Kurt and Dinosaur Jr. were almost vibrating the strings together in performance harmony.