Kevin Bronson on March 8th, 2015

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Reunions can be as much about watching the fans as the bands. Take Swervedriver’s show at the Roxy Theatre on Thursday, prime eavesdropping territory.

Long time no see. Nice T-shirt, dude. The Swervies, man. I saw them open for [fill in the band] at the [fill in the venue] in [fill in the date]. Never thought this would happen. “Rave Down,” man. I saw them on the [fill in the album] tour. The Nineties seem like they’re coming back, don’t ya think? This new album is so good. Hey, is it me or is this like really loud?

• ||| Photos by David Benjamin

Regarding the latter, it wasn’t exactly you — well, maybe your birth certificate — Swervedriver was really loud Thursday night, just like back in the day, and really intoxicating, just like back in the day. Maybe some of their fans have missed a beat, but as their first album in 17 years, “I Wasn’t Born to Lose You,” attests, the Swervies haven’t.

The band — guitarists Adam Franklin and Jimmy Hartridge, drummer Mikey Jones and Supergrass’ Mick Quinn filling in for Steve George on bass — bulldozed through 16 songs, including seven of the 10 on their new album, starting with “Autodidact.” Franklin was characteristically understated fronting the band, instead letting their interlaced guitars (he and Hartridge “converse” in that way) create a sound that was once described as “ethereal metal.”

Somewhat miscast as a shoegazers when they emerged in 1990 — owing much to their association with Creation Records and that label’s torchbearers My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive and Ride — Swervedriver derived their sound as much from noisy American indie bands of the time as their U.K. brethren. “I Wasn’t Born to Lose You” deviates little sonically from their four full-lengths (1991-98) and early EPs. On Thursday, fans got four songs from 1993’s “Mezcal Head,” along with new album highlight “Deep Wound,” a four-minute storm that would have fit well on any of those early records.

New songs “Last Rites” (which sounds like something Bob Mould might have done in one of his incarnations) and “Setting Sun” hit hard early in the set, and everybody in those old T-shirts raises their voices to the title tracks to two of the Swervies’ early EPs, “Son of Mustang Ford” (1990) and “Rave Down” (’91). Alternately, heads bowed and bodies swayed to the elongated, swirling new song “I Wonder?,” which is representative Swervedriver’s ability to simultaneously project something beautiful and inflict a little pain.

Franklin released music in three different guises during Swervedriver’s hiatus, most of it good. But it was not the Swervies. As their long-timers shook to loud-soft jabs of the finale, 1993’s “Duel,” the Swervies had to feel good about how they, and their music, have held up.

L.A. up-and-comers Gateway Drugs opened with a strong set of heavy psych-rock from their recently released debut “Magick Spells.” Pared down to a four-piece from a quintet, the band features sibling Noa, Liv and Niles, along with Blues Williams, and it was Gabriel — now back behind the kit and singing lead on several songs — who stole the show, bare-chested and hitting hard. Even battling a vocal mix that seemed to favor only guitarist Noa among the band’s three singers, Gateway Drugs proved a estimable force.