Weezer's Rad Attitude

It happened to U2. It happened to the Goo Goo Dolls. Now, the same thing is happening to Weezer. Alternative bands inevitably transition from rock to pop. They hit the musical world like razor blades and cut their way into music history with era-defining albums, like U2’s The Joshua Tree (1987) and Weezer’s self-titled debut album, Weezer (1994). Then, ten years into their respective aftermaths, innovative albums like U2’s Pop (1997) and Weezer’s Make Believe (2005) are released, fascinating some and frustrating others. Weezer continues to impress and frustrate with the release of Raditude, which extends the innovative transition, while also attempting to bridge the gap between itself and the Weezer of old.
If someone were to flash back to that debut album, also known as “the blue album” to differentiate it from Weezer’s other two self-titled albums, that person would find an album with several classic '90’s hits, like “Buddy Holly,” “Undone -- The Sweater Song,” “Say It Ain’t So,” and the Guitar Hero anthologized “My Name Is Jonas.” The songs are relatively simple in chord pattern and rhythm and most of the guitar parts are garage-band-hard in a style that most novice guitar players could imitate with little difficulty. Rivers Cuomo even comments on this style in the chorus of “In The Garage,” as he sings, “In the garage I feel safe / No one cares about my ways / In the garage / Where I belong.” Nonetheless, the songs are catchy and help define a decade dominated by grungy rock, doing for the mid-to-late 90’s what U2’s The Joshua Tree did for the late 80’s and early 90’s, as Rolling Stone described the album as lifting the band “from heroes to superstars.”
Weezer satisfied its near-cult followers for three more albums. Pinkerton (1996) came first. Not well received at first (Rolling Stone referred to it as “the worst album of the year” in 1996), it slowly gathered followers, though not to the platinum-selling status of its predecessor. Nonetheless, it is now credited by Rolling Stone for being “a cornerstone of the late-Nineties emo movement” for its dark, abrasive sound that came from lead singer Rivers Cuomo’s lonely experience at Harvard. The album Maladroit (2002) was a similar case in garage-band sound and popularity, though not as dark as Pinkerton. Another self-titled album came in between the two in 2001, this one known as “the green album,” which brought Weezer back to platinum selling status with drug ballad hits “Hash Pipe” and “Island In The Sun.” The latter of which has made its rounds in movies and television, having appeared in episodes of The Sopranos, Smallville, The Simpsons, and the series finale of Spin City. The movies it has appeared in include Mary Kate and Ashley’s Holiday in the Sun (2001), snowboard comedy Out Cold (2001), and Adam Sandler’s Mr. Deeds (2002).
However, no matter how much success is had with a certain style, a band has to change at some point. Whether to grow up as musicians or to avoid being called one-dimensional, a band has to experiment and prove themselves as versatile musicians. U2 did it with the release of Pop, which received mixed reviews. Rolling Stone referred to it as “absolutely magnificent” and described U2 as “fiendishly clever,” where Neil Strauss, formerly of The New York Times, was not a fan and commented that “U2 and techno don’t mix.” Similarly, Weezer’s evolution in Make Believe, an album that launched two songs to the top of the charts in “Beverly Hills” and “Perfect Situation,” received similar reactions. Rolling Stone described the album as “a breakthrough for Weezer,” where The New York Times called it “infuriatingly plain.” The band’s experimentation was evident throughout the album and the song “Beverly Hills” may have indirectly commented on their transformation, as Rivers Cuomo sings “Beverly Hills / That’s where I want to be,” but also sings “I just don’t belong,” marking the musical transition as a difficult one. “This Is Such A Pity” was by far this album’s most serious departure from Weezer’s alternative grunge-rock style, as it seemed a tribute to the 70’s and 80’s pop band, The Cars, given that Cars singer/guitarist Ric Ocasek was responsible for producing Weezer’s platinum-selling self-titled blue and green albums.
A third self-titled album later in 2008 (“the red album”) and now through Raditude in 2009, Weezer has continued to experiment, but has offered some consolation for the old cult followers. “The red album” was nearly all extended experimentation, offering several songs that departed from the original Weezer sound even more so than in Make Believe, with a great deal of never-before-seen by Weezer synthesized techno rhythms. Guitarist Brian Bell was even allowed his own song. Perhaps the most fascinating experiment of “the red album” came in the form of “The Greatest Man Who Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn),” a mini-epic that features several musical transformations of its own. Throughout the song, the genre changes from hip-hop to metal to soft rock to just about every genre a person can think of and even offers medieval Gregorian chant. Weezer actually teases its cult followers in the hit song “Pork And Beans,” a song that features the old Weezer sound, but also a chorus that sings “Ima do the things that I wanna do / I ain’t got a thing to prove to you” and “I don’t give a hoot about what you think.”
In that same song, Weezer geniusly foreshadowed the experimentation to be had in Raditude, as Rivers Cuomo sang “Timbaland knows the way to the top of the charts / Maybe if I work with him I can perfect the art.” Well, it is not Timbaland that he works with in Raditude, but it is someone from the same pop genre that Weezer is experimenting with--Lil Wayne. No, you did not read that wrong--the song “Can’t Stop Partying” features a surprise interlude by Lil Wayne. Disregarding the genre-romping “Greatest Man Who Ever Lived,” “Can’t stop Partying” represents the largest departure from Weezer’s original garage-band sound to be seen through their seven albums. Other notable departures in Raditude include a catchy ‘50’s malt-shop-pop geek-love song in the form of “(If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To)” and a couple slow, touching love songs in the forms of “Put Me Back Together” and “I Don’t Want To Let You Go.”
Though Raditude features that largest departure, it also features several songs that do return to the original sound. “Let It All Hang Out” and “In The Mall” offer the old garage-band-hard guitar riffs, only slightly more difficult for the novice guitar player to play. However, the mastery of Raditude does not lie in the fact that it has some innovative songs and some songs that feature classic Weezer sound, but in the fact that there are some songs that combine the two. “I’m Your Daddy,” “The Girl Got Hot,” and “Tripping Down the Freeway” offer a combination of some garage band guitar with some synthesized techno rhythms and the quirky lyrics that have stayed with Weezer throughout their career.
Given the combination of pop experimentation and return to originality in Raditude, it is tough to say how Weezer’s seventh album will fare. The first single from the album, “(If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To,” has not exactly been a hit, despite its catchiness. We will have to wait and see if Weezer continues to survive the evolution that plagues alternative rock bands and their fans. U2 survived theirs. But, U2 was not teaming up with Lil Wayne to write songs about partying at the age of forty either. All in all, I give Weezer serious kudos for th catchy combination of originality and evolution to be found in Raditude.