The ever-evolving musical vehicle for notorious psych-rock musician Anton Newcombe, the Brian Jonestown Massacre has endured numerous phases and iterations since arriving in the mid-’90s, becoming something of an independent institution in the process.
Early highlights like 1996’s Their Satanic Majesties’ Second Request showed Newcombe’s propensity for melding late-’60s psychedelia with textured shoegaze, while later standouts like 2015’s imaginary soundtrack Musique de Film Imaginé took a more cerebral and experimental approach. Undoubtedly, the band’s most visible period followed the release of the 2004 documentary film DIG!, which focused on the contentious relationship between Newcombe and Dandy Warhols frontman Courtney Taylor-Taylor. With the film criticized by members of both groups for what they considered to be an unfair portrayal, the Brian Jonestown Massacre nonetheless survived the media attention and moved into a particularly fertile period of creativity throughout the 2010s. The band’s first release of the next decade was 2022’s Fire Doesn’t Grow on Trees, quickly followed by 2023’s Your Future Is Your Past.
