Dinosaur Jr.

Check out the rough-and-tumble '87 take on the Cure smash "Just Like Heaven," and it's easy to hear how Dinosaur Jr. built their own bridge between the quirk of '80s alt-pop and the rumbling rock thunder of the coming grunge revolution. The group stomped well into the coming decades — and indie rock history — by making the most of front man J. Mascis' sleepwalker's drawl, wake-up-the-neighborhood guitar crunch, and ironic lyrical edge, laying down post-punk signposts like the heavy-hitting "Start Choppin" and the MTV breakout "Feel the Pain" along the way.

Check out Next Steps for more of the music made when Dinosaur Jr. walks the Earth.

The screaming solo from 1993's "What Else Is New?" might have sounded right at home reverberating out over a '70s arena-rock crowd, but classic sounds are only one element in Dinosaur Jr.'s mixed musical bag. Folky flute tones and J. Mascis' knife's-edge whine slice through the heavy sonic sludge of "Thumb," while "Sure Not Over You" flirts with jazz, and "I Don't Think" weaves sweetened, popped-up vocals and fistfuls of raw guitar power into one massive fuzz ball o' rock.

Our Dinosaur Jr. playlists aren't extinct yet — the proof lives in Deep Cuts.

Naturally, more than 20 years spent making music means one-offs and more than one milestone. We've sorted out the best of Dinosaur Jr.'s two-plus decades to bring you everything from mid-'80s beginnings — the punk rock hotrod "The Leper" — to the hefty supercrunch of latter-day rockers like "Nothin's Goin On." There's lots in between, too, including a loud and lazy "Ammaring" from side-trip J. Mascis & The Fog and the NRBQ cover "I Want You Bad," which gets the full Mascis treatment, charcoal-broiler solo and all.

J. Mascis was a college-town kid in mid-'80s Amherst, Mass., when Dinosaur Jr. — his band with on-and-off bassist Lou Barlow — rose up to stalk the land, bringing smart-mouthed lyrics, loads of slacker 'tude, and behemoth rock sounds to the indie masses. Early calling cards, like the alt-cult classic "Freak Scene," announced a fresh force to be reckoned with; more than two decades later, Mascis is still in the game with his trademark squeaky-wheel vocals, world-weary stance, and wall-of-sound guitars on everything from "Out There," with its wailing, Neil Young-style solo, to new stuff like the rock 'n' roll survivor's serenade "We're Not Alone." Our Dinosaur Jr. Essentials lays it all out, nice and easy, for hardcore fans and brand-new explorers alike.