What is it about Rivers Cuomo and Matt Sharp that makes my word count runneth over? I'm not sure I know any more. At first it was because I loved their music, and now maybe it's because I measure myself against the way I used to feel about their music, the changes and gaps between now and then. Anyway, here is a list of twelve pieces I have written during the last nine years. I can't promise this list is finished, either, because Jessica Suarez's Pinkerton book is coming out next year, as is (probably) the deluxe reissue of that record. I am hoping that after those come out, I will be able to wash my hands of this whole business. But I kind of doubt it. Note: the last 3 pieces mentioned here have been published within the last week, two of them today.
Written as Weezer was beginning to emerge from their 1997-2001 hiatus. This was the height of my obsession with the band, obviously, and a setup for the anguish and heartbreak that was to come. I really believed that Weezer was going to save popular music. I was wrong.
The disappointment begins. Waited in line at midnight to buy with record with Gwen and Sarah at Sonic Boom in Fremont (RIP), even though I had already heard the mp3s and gotten a promo copy of it. Saul really was singing "Island in the Sun" all the time.
I bought Maladriot at an HMV in Bath, UK the day it came out. I kind of fell in love with it during the rest of my trip, even though I also thought it was pretty bad. My friend Brian and I sat at the back of the our study-tour bus and belted out the lyrics to "Take Control." We were also really into Andrew WK for a few months, so it kind of fit in with the whole feel of the trip.
I interviewed Matt Sharp for Paste during his super-low-key comeback tour. The music was really long, slow, and boring, but I liked it. This was the first of three times I have interviewed Sharp. To be diplomatic: it is not easy to pull out coherent quotes from these interviews.
Not unlike the piece I wrote during the Weezer hiatus, this piece for the Portland Mercury (from a phone interview with Sharp after the first reunited Rentals tour began) is mostly me thinking that maybe a band that made two of my favorite records is going to make some great music. Once again, I may not have been entirely right.
I'm pretty sure this is an accurate assessment of the first recording by the New-Rentals, who disappeared almost as quickly as they were assembled.
MISSING: A feature on the Rentals for the Inlander
I can't find this anywhere, but it is pretty similar to the Mercury piece, except I was more skeptical. Again based on a phone interview. Their show in Spokane was the last one I went to before moving to China, and also the time I realized that rock and roll shows were no longer as important to me as they used to be.
Yes, I am the totally cliche Weezer fan who hates Weezer, and only likes obscure unreleased things they did between 1994 and 1998.
A review of Weezer's almost good third s/t album.
The Rentals are getting better, I think -- I haven't listened to the thing as a whole record yet, but I'm liking many of the individual songs. Songs About Time is also an interesting look at what happens when the music industry implodes and you resurrect a band that existed during the height of the CD era.
Notice I have not even really tried to make a value judgement about the latest Weezer record. The single is fantastic, but the rest of the record, well ... I simply can't evaluate it. It's beyond "good" or "bad."
A short personal essay about (what else?) being a teenager, love, girls, ambivalence, and the Rentals, which I started writing almost five years ago, now up at Good Letters.
