When Weezer's debut album came out in 1994, frontman Rivers Cuomo didn't sound too much like a new spokesman for his generation. Sure, he rattled off some great and funny lines, but it's mostly the music that made 'The Blue Album' a hit. But by the time they returned with 'Pinkerton,' it seemed like Cuomo was opening random pages of his diary and penning songs about his most personal reflections.
It was pretty much an unwritten rule that if you were a modern-rock band that came of age in the ‘90s, you’d have great success with your first album. You’d be all over the radio and MTV, and the U.K. music press would compare you to Nirvana and label you the Next Big Thing. Then you’d release your second album, which would be a massive bomb, and continue to make records that nobody heard until you either retired from the music business altogether or played the summer rib circuit with other bands suffering your fate.
Most people figured that the five-year break between ‘Pinkerton’ and Weezer’s self-titled third LP, better known as ‘The Green Album,’ signaled the end of the band. After all, in the ‘90s, modern rock was just as disposable and as unforgiving as the most uneventful pop music. But ‘The Green Album’ became a massive hit, reaching No. 4 (their highest showing at the time) and going platinum. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Especially to a group that just took off five years so its frontman could find himself.
When Weezer’s self-titled debut, now known as ‘The Blue Album,’ came out on May 10, 1994, it sounded like any number of alt-rock records that were flooding the shelves in the post-Nirvana era. Its first single, the likable but mostly hook-free ‘Undone – The Sweater Song,’ certainly didn’t point to the modern-rock superstardom to come. And neither did the relatively unassuming album. At first.
When Weezer's debut album came out in 1994, nobody expected the Los Angeles band to change the way an entire branch of alt-rock sounded. By the end of the decade, a devoted cluster of fans had picked up guitars and started their own bands that adopted Weezer's fuzzy classic rock-inspired riffs and frontman Rivers Cuomo's nerdy-but-sincere pop songs about being nerdy and sincere. Their debut album made them MTV stars, their
You’ve seen them at parties, lurking in the corner, waiting to engage in battle disguised as conversation. They’re indie rock know-it-alls, and no matter what band or musician you mention, they’ve got an opinion — strong and almost certainly negative — ready to ram down your throat. With Instant Expert, we offe
Mickey Welsh's actual death wasn't all that mysterious -- he died of a drug overdose, which has been known to kill many a rock star -- but the circumstances surrounding the former Weezer bassist's tragic end certainly were. Eerily, Welsh pretty much predicted both the exact time and location of his death -- and via a Facebook post for all his fans to read, no less.
-- Not to be outdone by Apple's recent iPhone 5 press conference with the Foo Fighters, Microsoft has lined up Weezer to rock out at the opening gala of a brand new retail store opening on Sept. 29 at the Christiana Mall in Newark, Del.
