For years I knew the name (once heard, never forgotten) but never really paid any attention to the Brian Jonestown Massacre. Until I saw them in the rockumentary Dig!

One of the best of its kind, it’s an unintentionally tragicomic portrait of the bitter rivalry between two supreme egotists who lead bands – Anton Newcombe of the BJM and Courtney Taylor-Taylor of the Dandy Warhols.

Theirs is a love-hate affair in which you spend much of the time wishing they would just get a room. And it’s all the more pathetic because only one of the bands (the Dandys) has had any mainstream success.

Newcombe, of course, accuses them of that age-old crime of indie bands, “selling out.” Which is easy to do when you’ve never had a hit of any kind.

Each of them seems equally threatened by the other’s actual talent; which is just as well as there is no contest when it comes to any measurable criteria of commercial success.

The Dandys had a string of hit singles (and albums) in the late 90s and early 00s, while the BJM have never had a single one, and spent most of their career giving their albums away online.

The final irony being that if their of them spent the evening in your local bar the clientele would be unlikely to recognise either of them.

Anyway, when it comes to music, for me the BJM have the edge, but even that is hard to measure because the Dandys’ output varies wildly in quality – at their best (Bohemian Like You, Get Off) they are in a different league, but some of their output is unlistenable.

Meanwhile, Newcombe’s crew have ploughed the same narcotic furrow from the start (sample album title: Bravery, Repetition, Noise) making it hard to choose a standout song from their vast repertoire.

Try this one, which comes with a splendid recommendation from the late celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain: “Drenched in opiates and regret, I heard this song once and became besotted by it. It sounds like lost love, past lives, unforgiven mistakes and transgressions.”

It’s hard to disagree.