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Speaker 1: Too Much Information is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hello everyone, and welcome to Too Much Information, the show

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Speaker 2: that brings you the secret histories and little known fascinating

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Speaker 2: facts and figures behind your favorite movies, music, TV shows,

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Speaker 2: and more. We are your two power poppers of precision podcasting.

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Speaker 2: I'm Alex Hegel.

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Speaker 3: There's sweater wearing savants of That's all I got.

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Speaker 1: We've really done.

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Speaker 2: We've done enough of these that I'm like, really, I'm

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Speaker 2: struggling with the alliteration bit. We might have to retire

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Speaker 2: that point. There's only so many ways to say trivia,

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Speaker 2: all right, I know, not that many different ways to

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Speaker 2: say trivia, minutia, fainality. I've been through, but I've been

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Speaker 2: through so many ye and I'm Jordan run Talk.

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Speaker 1: And Jordan.

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Speaker 2: Today we're talking about one of the defining albums of

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Speaker 2: the nineteen nineties, the slacker masterpiece that taught the world

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Speaker 2: heavy metal guitars could easily cozy up alongside the more

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Speaker 2: droll and quirky side of grunt and father figure induced depression.

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Speaker 2: That's right, folks, we're talking about Weezer's self titled debut

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Speaker 2: aka the Blue Album. This band is so funny to me,

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Speaker 2: and particularly this album. I'm not like a Weezer guy.

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Speaker 2: There are Weezer people out there, they are insane. I'm

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Speaker 2: not one of them. I think at some point when

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Speaker 2: people were like, yeah, there's like seven terrible Weezer albums,

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Speaker 2: but then when you get to the two good songs

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Speaker 2: on each one of those, then you're really cooking. I'm

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Speaker 2: like not interested. However, this album is a masterpiece. And

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Speaker 2: it's funny because when we were growing up, Weezer was

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Speaker 2: like the Islands in the Sun band, right, and Green

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Speaker 2: album come out, So that's the one where they re

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Speaker 2: teamed with Rick Okasik after self producing Pinkerton, So that's

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Speaker 2: why there hits on that record.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, I and hash pipe.

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Speaker 2: Whips, but like, yeah, I saw those videos and I

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Speaker 2: was like, Okay, this is a perfectly fine rock band.

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Speaker 2: And then someone played me their car the World has

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Speaker 2: turned and left me here, and I was like, oh,

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Speaker 2: this is genius. What is this and they're like this

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Speaker 2: is the first Weezer album, idiot. And then at some

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Speaker 2: point in the seventeen reissues that this album has had,

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Speaker 2: you know, I found one of the remasters and I

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Speaker 2: was like, oh, this thing sounds incredible.

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Speaker 1: It's re oquay sic. Yeah, but it's we'll get into.

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Speaker 2: The what they like. They're actual micing techniques and so forth.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, I don't know.

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Speaker 2: I mean, you know, and it's funny because like my

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Speaker 2: appreciation for them falls off a very steep cliff. It's

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Speaker 2: like Blue Album, top of the heap. I acknowledged that

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Speaker 2: Pinkerton has stuff going for it, but I never really

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Speaker 2: glommed onto it the same way. And then zero to

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Speaker 2: five percent interest in everything else that they've done.

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Speaker 3: You I, I mean, I I feel like I always

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Speaker 3: invoke this on the show, and I'm getting self conscious

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Speaker 3: about doing so. But I've talked about how I didn't

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Speaker 3: really engage with a lot of pop culture or contemporary

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Speaker 3: pop culture as a kid.

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Speaker 1: But I like Weezer.

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Speaker 3: I mean they sung about sweaters and they had a

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Speaker 3: video that looked like the Happy Day set. Yeah, so

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Speaker 3: I was for a nicket night kid who went to

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Speaker 3: private school at this time and exclusively wore chinos and sweaters.

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Speaker 1: I felt very seen.

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Speaker 3: And Island and the Sun came out right when I

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Speaker 3: got my first guitar and I was trying to learn

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Speaker 3: to play, and I went on all those early tab sites.

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Speaker 1: And good Lord. There were a lot of.

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Speaker 3: Weezer guitar parts on those early tab sites and first

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Speaker 3: song I learned to playing guitar was Island in the

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Speaker 3: Sun could still nail the solo and somewhere there's a

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Speaker 3: tape of me and my best friend and I believe

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Speaker 3: his dad jamming in their basement to Island on the song.

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Speaker 3: So I always have a soft spot for Weezer, But yeah, no,

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Speaker 3: I agree with you. Weezer were the band that all

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Speaker 3: of my friends who actually liked rock and roll were into.

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Speaker 3: Because a lot of my friends in you know, ninety eight,

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Speaker 3: ninety nine, two thousand were into the you know, the

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Speaker 3: fred Durst of it all, and the ones of mine

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Speaker 3: that actually liked rock bands pre Strokes were really into Weezer,

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Speaker 3: and they were always trying to educate me more onto

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Speaker 3: I like the Blue album and I like the Green album.

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Speaker 3: They were always trying to get me into Pinkerton never

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Speaker 3: really stuck for me. But it's too raw for you,

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Speaker 3: it is, It's too scary. He also he also loves

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Speaker 3: the Beach Boys. He also loves my beloved beach Bolls. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: and so I mean beach Boys, happy Day sweaters and

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Speaker 3: I was always trying to look like the Beatles at

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Speaker 3: that time, and I had a haircut just like Rivers Cuomo.

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Speaker 1: I mean it had a lot going. You had the

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Speaker 1: bolt Oh you did have the bolt cut? Seen it?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Wow?

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Speaker 1: So really, you know, how could I band?

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Speaker 2: Yeah?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't have the same academic appreciation for them

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Speaker 3: as you do. As with most things we discussed, I mean,

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Speaker 3: this song Slap, that's like really the and it's it

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Speaker 3: is it's hard to listen now with ears of man

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Speaker 3: of our age.

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Speaker 2: How insanely out of touch this sounded when it came out,

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Speaker 2: Oh my god, you know, like weeks was it months

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Speaker 2: after Kirka being killed himself? So we were in like

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Speaker 2: a leaderless, a rudderless grunge era, but probably like the

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Speaker 2: lunkheaded parts of it like Bush. I guess I don't

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Speaker 2: know when the first Bush album came out, but it

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Speaker 2: feels right to me to.

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Speaker 1: Say that, Oh, that sounds about right to me.

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Speaker 2: And to just get these massive guitars and also man

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Speaker 2: having Matt Sharp double the vocals in Falsetto for like

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Speaker 2: ninety percent of the record. Such a bizarre choice works perfectly,

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Speaker 2: is my opinion. I know it's a dividing one. But yeah,

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Speaker 2: what a bizarre breath of fresh air this must have

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Speaker 2: sounded like. And it's such a dumb roads diverging in

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Speaker 2: a wood moment, because we could have gotten like a

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Speaker 2: legion of amazing. We could have had like a power

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Speaker 2: pop renaissance in the mid nineties, and instead this idiot

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Speaker 2: country was like, let's do swing and third wave ska

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Speaker 2: instead and rap rock, oh yeah, and rap rock. Mustn't

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Speaker 2: forget rap rock. Yeah, man, Jesus Christ, we're dumb, dumb country.

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Speaker 2: You took a band who was obsessed with the cars

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Speaker 2: and flattened them out in favor of sca pick it up,

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Speaker 2: pick it up, pick it up, go yeah.

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Speaker 1: Torment you during band practice.

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Speaker 3: By just doing that into any open mic, we could find.

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Speaker 2: Okay, well, let's not dwell on that.

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Speaker 1: Uh.

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Speaker 2: From Rivers Cromo's Father Issues to Spike Jones and a

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Speaker 2: Pack of Dogs, and the repeated influence of the Beach Boys,

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Speaker 2: as well as the elaborate audio collage that threatened to

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Speaker 2: tank the entire album. Here's everything you didn't know about

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Speaker 2: Weezer's Blue album. This one. I like to call Mark

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Speaker 2: Rothko's number sixty one a rusted Blue.

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Speaker 1: That's one of the more high ends ones. Wow.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, most of your headings are things like Crank and

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Speaker 3: the Hog or things like that.

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Speaker 1: And this is come with rothka.

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Speaker 2: Well, I googled famous blue paintings.

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Speaker 1: Ah okay.

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Speaker 2: So the Blue Album and most of Weezer is primarily

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Speaker 2: the works of the band's frontman, Rivers Cuomo. And since

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Speaker 2: most of Weezer's best work is based on whatever that

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Speaker 2: man's got rattled around inside of his skull, which I know,

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Speaker 2: don't envy, here's just what led up to the Blue

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Speaker 2: Album in Old Riversville.

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Speaker 1: Cuomo was born on.

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Speaker 2: June thirteenth, nineteen seventy, in New York City. His father, Frank,

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Speaker 2: was a musician who played drums on the nineteen seventy

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Speaker 2: one album Odyssey of Isca by Wayne Shorter. Making his

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Speaker 2: second appearance on the pod after the Steely Dan Asia episode,

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Speaker 2: shouts to Wayne Shorter rip Yeah, yes, he is dead.

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Speaker 2: And there's a revealing dispute between his parents over the

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Speaker 2: source of his name. That's pretty illustrative of his entire deal. Supposedly,

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Speaker 2: River's mom, Beverly, christened him after the East and Hudson

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Speaker 2: Rivers bordering Manhattan, while his father later claimed that Rivers

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Speaker 2: was named after three prominent soccer players, Rivalino, Luigi Riva,

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Speaker 2: and Gihnny Rivera, all of whom were playing in the

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Speaker 2: nineteen seventy World Cup. Cromo was also born with one

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Speaker 2: leg shorter than the other and had to wear special shoes,

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Speaker 2: one with a lift, which he has described as just

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Speaker 2: one more reason that I wasn't as cool as everyone else.

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Speaker 3: Oh this man guy, I mean not on one hand,

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Speaker 3: I get it, but he does seem to have a

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Speaker 3: very sizable chip on his shoulder.

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Speaker 1: Is that. Yes, I think he's just like beaten down.

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Speaker 2: He's a really fascinating guy and like I find, honestly

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Speaker 2: like the engagement with him and his personality like much

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Speaker 2: more interesting than the band, Like how he talks about

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Speaker 2: he has like a he I guess. At one point

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Speaker 2: there was an interview he was like, I have like

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Speaker 2: an obsession with planning things out right, So from my

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Speaker 2: Twitter account, I have like thousands of banked tweets that

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Speaker 2: I just wrote beforehand and like auto scheduled. And I

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Speaker 2: think so much of his pain is coming from this

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Speaker 2: like person with a deep inferiority complex and like dad

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Speaker 2: issues who grow up obsessed with like highly technical, aggressive

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Speaker 2: masculine music, trying to make like psyche plumbing sensitive guy

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Speaker 2: rock wow okay, and just being like cowed into inarticulateness

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Speaker 2: by the vastness of that enterprise. Well said, I over

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Speaker 2: intellectualized it enough.

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Speaker 1: That makes a lot, Yeah, it makes a lot of sense.

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Speaker 2: Well.

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Speaker 3: River's family lived in Rochester, New York, at the city's

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Speaker 3: Zen Center until River's father, Frank, left in nineteen seventy

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Speaker 3: five at the Corney Rivers he saw his dad only

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Speaker 3: three times over the next twenty years, at ages seven, eleven,

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Speaker 3: and sixteen, and not again until nineteen ninety five, the

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Speaker 3: year when his airing of his feelings about the relationship

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Speaker 3: came out in Say it Ain't So Weezer song. Frank

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Speaker 3: meanwhile became a Pentecostal preacher. River's mother, Beverly, relocated to Yogaville, and,

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Speaker 3: noticing a theme here from Zen Center to Yogaville, an

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Speaker 3: ashram in Pumfret, Connecticut, and she married a guy named

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Speaker 3: Stephen Kitts, and young Rivers re christened himself Peter kits

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Speaker 3: Possibly you right because it was so close to the

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Speaker 3: name Peter Chris Kisses, drummer of whom Rivers was a

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Speaker 3: huge fan.

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Speaker 1: Are you serious?

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Speaker 2: No, but I would postulate it way to factored into it.

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Speaker 3: Rivers told Magnet magazine in twenty fourteen it was a

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Speaker 3: very rural and agrarian environment. Only Rivers would describe where

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Speaker 3: he grew up as an agrarian environ.

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Speaker 1: Wow, that's somebody who went to Harvard.

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Speaker 2: I know we talk a lot about these VH one

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Speaker 2: like talking head as you bleep it every time, sucking

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Speaker 2: extravaganzas that populated our youth. But do you remember the

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Speaker 2: one when Mobi uses the word Insussians to describe Nirvana

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Speaker 2: and or Kurt Cobain and they pull up a chirn

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Speaker 2: with the definition of the word.

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Speaker 1: Funestly, I think I kind of do remember this, Sash.

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Speaker 3: I feel like Moby and Rivers are cut from the

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Speaker 3: same insufferably academic cloth.

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Speaker 1: Well.

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Speaker 2: I was just like, oh, so that's what happens, Because

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Speaker 2: as a kid who knew way too many, like ten

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Speaker 2: dollars words from reading and not speaking, I was like, Oh,

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Speaker 2: that's what happens.

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Speaker 1: People make fun of you for.

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Speaker 3: Just talking like that, and somebody in your school says

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Speaker 3: your mom gave birth to a dictionary.

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Speaker 2: That's true.

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Speaker 3: That's both something I would take as a compliment at

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Speaker 3: that age and also a very highly developed burn for

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Speaker 3: a third grader.

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Speaker 1: Fifth grader.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that kid checked him up on Facebook.

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Speaker 2: But I hope he's dead.

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Speaker 1: Just say he's dead, Okay.

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Speaker 2: Shout out to Kolner An elementary school bully.

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Speaker 3: Uh Yes, Rivers describing the place where he grew up

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Speaker 3: as an agrarian environment. I had chores like feeding ponies,

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Speaker 3: clearing weeds and gardening and cooking and cleaning, yoga, meditation

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Speaker 3: practice every day, and then some traditional academics and a

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Speaker 3: lot of self led creative projects. I couldn't imagine a

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Speaker 3: more nurturing, safe and supportive environment for a kid to

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Speaker 3: grow up in. And yet still he turned out like that.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I mean he didn't see anyone in uh

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Speaker 2: he didn't have any social interaction with his like normal

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Speaker 2: children until the first time he's plopped into middle school,

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Speaker 2: which you know, I man, the more you learn about

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Speaker 2: this guy, were you're like, I'm surprised you made it as.

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Speaker 1: Far as you did.

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Speaker 2: Buddy's like you're the prototype for like a lone wolf

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Speaker 2: mass shooter. Basically is there.

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Speaker 1: I'm sure we'll get to this later.

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Speaker 3: I feel like we do sort of touch on it

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Speaker 3: on some lyrics to his songs.

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Speaker 1: Is there anything you know a lot more about him

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Speaker 1: than I do?

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Speaker 3: Is there anything problematic about Rivers?

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Speaker 1: The women stuff?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, I guess we'll get more.

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Speaker 1: We'll get to it. We'll get to it well.

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Speaker 3: River's unique childhood meant that the first time he was

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Speaker 3: exposed to non ashram or Yogi lifestyle at the age

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Speaker 3: of eleven was when he entered public school for the

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Speaker 3: first time, as you just mentioned. But despite this, Rivers

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Speaker 3: was a member of the high school choir and performed

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Speaker 3: in a school production of Greece at one point. I

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Speaker 3: would love to have a tape of that if that's

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Speaker 3: on YouTube. And while growing up a medal kid, he

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Speaker 3: worshiped at the era appropriate altars of the aforementioned Kiss,

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Speaker 3: Iron Maiden, Slayer.

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Speaker 1: And Judas Priest.

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Speaker 3: That's an interesting marriage of theater kid and heavy metal kid.

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Speaker 3: I guess they're so far around the circle that they

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Speaker 3: almost touch. Consequently, one of his first bands was a

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Speaker 3: glam metal group called Avant Garde.

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Speaker 1: Who he moved to La with in nineteen eighty nine.

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Speaker 1: At the age of nineteen.

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Speaker 3: All five members of the band lived in the same

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Speaker 3: studio apartment, and Rivers was the lead guitarist, having no

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Speaker 3: designs on the front man position. He told Rolling Stone

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Speaker 3: in twenty nineteen, I could have seen myself in the NBA.

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Speaker 1: As easily as being a lead singer in a metal band.

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Speaker 2: That was just like unthinkable. Yeah, and you know, they

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Speaker 2: were just victims of bad timing. It was not a

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Speaker 2: good time to be an aspiring hair metal band in LA.

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Speaker 2: The scene reached peak saturation in the late eighties and

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Speaker 2: quickly I think found its biggest export in Guns n'

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Speaker 2: Roses and then later on like Poison, But the specter

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Speaker 2: of grunge was already holding up its rusted scythe to

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Speaker 2: the throat of the hair metal genre as a whole. Also,

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Speaker 2: I find this hilarious Cuomo. I think before like regular college,

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Speaker 2: he enrolled at the Guitar Institute of Technology, which is

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Speaker 2: a for profit college in LA that I think is

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Speaker 2: now just the Musicians Institute, and it is just like

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Speaker 2: the place that produced like every hair metal band Shredder

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Speaker 2: of the eighties. Jennifer Batton, who is Michael Jackson's lead guitarist.

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Speaker 2: The guys in Steel Panther. I think some of the

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Speaker 2: guys who were in the Mars Vault like session players.

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Speaker 2: It just teaches you how to shred. But sadly he

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Speaker 2: flunked out. So Avant Garde was renamed Zoom, which is funny.

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Speaker 2: So he got into g t but he basically he

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Speaker 2: said I couldn't bring myself to get into diligent student

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Speaker 2: mode and was basically expelled. He said, I was thinking

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Speaker 2: of myself as a lead guitar player, thinking that faster

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Speaker 2: harmonic minor scales equals better, which is true, thinking that

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Speaker 2: I could move out to La with Avant Garde and

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Speaker 2: we were just going to be huge rock stars. Then

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Speaker 2: seeing one band member after another leave abandoned me and

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Speaker 2: not being able to hold it together or put it

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Speaker 2: back together. And then he had two back to back breakups,

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Speaker 2: which frustrated metal guitarist to again loan tudo profile like

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Speaker 2: frustrated metal guitarist, two bad breakups, and instead he started

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Speaker 2: working at a Tower Records, Yes, which was his inflection point.

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Speaker 3: Not only a Tower Records, well, he was the Tower

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Speaker 3: Records on Sunset right. There's like a documentary about that

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Speaker 3: plays a very famous La Landmark, right.

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Speaker 1: I believe so I don't care about La Well.

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Speaker 3: I believe that to be true. In fact, my brother

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Speaker 3: recently told me that's true. So I'm gonna take that

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Speaker 3: as gospel. He's a big weezerhead. Oh oh oh god,

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Speaker 3: I'm sorry. You should have told me that beforehand. Man,

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Speaker 3: Why Well, I don't know. I'll probably say something mean

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Speaker 3: at some point.

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Speaker 1: No, okay.

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Speaker 3: And also, in addition to working at Tower Records, he

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Speaker 3: met Weezer drummer Pat Wilson through a coworker at this store,

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Speaker 3: and the job meant that Rivers could expand his palate

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Speaker 3: beyond a strict diet of shred metal and into the

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Speaker 3: occasional eighties pop.

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Speaker 1: Like Madonna, which he had a weakness for. I love that,

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Speaker 1: and this is something that I love about him too.

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Speaker 3: I also don't have sophisticated taye in music, like We've

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Speaker 3: talked about this in the Britney Spears Cross Road episode,

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Speaker 3: Like I have this deep underside of Probably the contemporary

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Speaker 3: music that I love the most right now is probably

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Speaker 3: like pop, like I love Olivia Rudrigo, I love I

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Speaker 3: want Rihanna to come back with a new album. It's

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Speaker 3: been eight years, so I like that about him.

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Speaker 2: I just think it's funny how all the guys in

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Speaker 2: Weezer have like the most boring names ever except for

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Speaker 2: Rivers Cuomo. Yeah, their drummer is named Patrick Wilson, which

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Speaker 2: makes him the most second famous Patrick Wilson, after the

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Speaker 2: movie star Brian Bell, Matt Sharp, Scott Schriner. Now, like

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Speaker 2: just white guy names.

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Speaker 1: I had it.

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Speaker 2: I kept writing this and confusing Brian's with Matts, and

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Speaker 2: I know, I'm sure they all have very distinct and

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Speaker 2: wonderful personalities. But you're in a band with a guy

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Speaker 2: named Rivers Cuomo and you're all just you should have

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Speaker 2: picked different names, guys, go forget someone call it call

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Speaker 2: you snake or maybe he does or the cat ringo.

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Speaker 1: I mean, controversial.

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Speaker 3: Point, especially considering I'm discussing my favorite human being non

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Speaker 3: family category on the planet, Joni Mitchell. No, Paul McCartney

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Speaker 3: is like not a very famous sounding name, you know

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Speaker 3: what I mean.

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Speaker 2: McCartney though it has like a swing to it, a

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Speaker 2: r it rings, but it's not.

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Speaker 3: Like Freddie Mercury or like Brian May even or like, no,

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Speaker 3: there's a great name, Like that's a great name. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: Robert Plant even even though it kind of lands with

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Speaker 3: a thud.

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Speaker 2: Someone who's not white and British.

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Speaker 3: British, Right, you're right, you're right, Elvis Presley, that's your

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Speaker 3: famous name.

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Speaker 2: Well, I mean yeah, but even like rock star names like,

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Speaker 2: I do have to you know, what I do have

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Speaker 2: to say is that No, I'm going to take this back.

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Speaker 2: I thought gave Rossdale was a good British name, and

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Speaker 2: I was wrong. It sounds like an American rock star name. No,

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Speaker 2: it sounds like a poncey little private school pratt.

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Speaker 3: Those are some great, great English insults right there, though.

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Speaker 2: I'm very so the guy cheated on Gwen Stefani so like.

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Speaker 1: Dips right wing.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, And that is what happens with women from

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Speaker 2: Orange County, especially women who were into third wave ska

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Speaker 2: and pop punk. They all start out as like cool

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Speaker 2: punk rock chicks, and then they end up as conservative

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Speaker 2: women married to country people or guys who wish they

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Speaker 2: were country people. It's the natural evolution of things.

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Speaker 1: Are there any other examples?

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Speaker 2: No? Moving on, I'm sure. I'm sure probably everyone who

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Speaker 2: dated someone in a ska band in Fis County, every

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Speaker 2: single woman who ever knew in the biblical sense. A

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Speaker 2: SKA musician has become like a raging conservative, and I

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Speaker 2: can't blame them for that.

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Speaker 1: Being that close to Disneyland, man, what the hell are

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Speaker 1: you talking about? So Rivers.

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Speaker 3: He's working on Tower Records, and it broadens his musical

380
00:20:11,800 --> 00:20:15,440
Speaker 3: diet into you know, things that are in the charts,

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Speaker 3: like eighties pop, like Madonna. He would later say, At first,

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Speaker 3: I just could not get into other music. It sounded

383
00:20:22,240 --> 00:20:26,320
Speaker 3: like garbage to me. Velvet Underground Pet Sounds was reissued

384
00:20:26,320 --> 00:20:30,960
Speaker 3: around that time, Thirteenth Floor, Elevators, Pixies, Sonic Youth. It

385
00:20:31,040 --> 00:20:35,360
Speaker 3: all sounded like noise. I thought none of this is catchy,

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Speaker 3: but I came to love.

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Speaker 1: It all now. I don't understand how I missed it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and again, to be clear, he was avoiding all

389
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Speaker 2: this stuff in favor of like Dawkin, right, Okay, all

390
00:20:47,720 --> 00:20:48,640
Speaker 2: the Dawkin whips.

391
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Speaker 1: Yeah, you do love Dawkin, I do.

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00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:53,879
Speaker 3: Another current release that made it impact on him was

393
00:20:53,960 --> 00:20:58,359
Speaker 3: Nirvana's Bleach and specifically the song Silver. He recalled thinking

394
00:20:58,400 --> 00:21:00,840
Speaker 3: this is so beautiful to me, and I identify with

395
00:21:00,920 --> 00:21:03,920
Speaker 3: it so much. Hearing him sing about mom and dad

396
00:21:03,960 --> 00:21:07,679
Speaker 3: and Grandpa Joe. These personal family issues and a really heartbreaking,

397
00:21:07,760 --> 00:21:11,520
Speaker 3: kind of innocent, childlike way over these straightforward chords and

398
00:21:11,560 --> 00:21:14,960
Speaker 3: a major key. Then the distortion kicks in and he

399
00:21:15,040 --> 00:21:15,840
Speaker 3: starts screaming.

400
00:21:16,640 --> 00:21:17,439
Speaker 1: I would imagine that.

401
00:21:17,440 --> 00:21:20,000
Speaker 3: Would have a big impact on writing something like say

402
00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:21,120
Speaker 3: it Ain't so about his dad?

403
00:21:21,240 --> 00:21:23,880
Speaker 1: Right read on.

404
00:21:27,240 --> 00:21:32,040
Speaker 3: Cuomo and Pat with Patrick Patrick pals That's correct.

405
00:21:32,200 --> 00:21:33,160
Speaker 2: Got The actor.

406
00:21:33,480 --> 00:21:37,240
Speaker 3: Started a band called Fuzz, which unfortunately fizzled out after

407
00:21:37,280 --> 00:21:40,520
Speaker 3: a few shows. Fuzz then morphed into a short lived

408
00:21:40,520 --> 00:21:45,080
Speaker 3: group called this is one of the worst early early

409
00:21:45,119 --> 00:21:51,240
Speaker 3: band names I have ever heard, sixty Wrong Sausages, which

410
00:21:51,280 --> 00:21:55,600
Speaker 3: featured Rivers Tower Records coworker Pat Finn on bass and

411
00:21:55,640 --> 00:21:59,920
Speaker 3: another friend of Pat Finn's, Jason Cropper on guitar, related

412
00:22:00,080 --> 00:22:01,640
Speaker 3: to Steve Cropper of.

413
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Speaker 1: Musclache of Stacks.

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Speaker 3: They broke up, unfortunately after just a single gig at

415
00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:13,240
Speaker 3: the Phoenix Theater and Pedaluma on Thanksgiving weekend nineteen ninety one. Petaluma.

416
00:22:13,440 --> 00:22:16,040
Speaker 3: That sounds like a punchline, you know what I mean?

417
00:22:16,080 --> 00:22:17,800
Speaker 3: It sounds yeah, it's the name.

418
00:22:18,160 --> 00:22:19,960
Speaker 2: It's just one of those like it's like a Bay

419
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Speaker 2: Area bedroom community.

420
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Speaker 1: At this point, it just sounds like one of those things.

421
00:22:23,880 --> 00:22:26,480
Speaker 3: It sounds like, you know, Chattanooga chu Chuo, like taking

422
00:22:26,520 --> 00:22:30,639
Speaker 3: the taking, the taking, the p train, the Pedaloma. I

423
00:22:30,640 --> 00:22:33,359
Speaker 3: don't know, it just just seems like something that somebody

424
00:22:33,400 --> 00:22:35,800
Speaker 3: would be waving a scar around and singing about.

425
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Speaker 1: Petaluma. Yeah.

426
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Speaker 2: I mean, that's the entirety of California, right, It's like

427
00:22:39,600 --> 00:22:41,920
Speaker 2: built on the bones of you know, a bunch of

428
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:46,119
Speaker 2: migrant workers, robber barons, and everything's only like two hundred

429
00:22:46,200 --> 00:22:49,720
Speaker 2: years old. Like this in state is brand new by

430
00:22:49,720 --> 00:22:54,399
Speaker 2: comparison to like Massachusetts, So why are we talking about Pedaluma?

431
00:22:55,119 --> 00:22:56,840
Speaker 1: Finished the side side sigh.

432
00:22:59,320 --> 00:23:02,080
Speaker 3: Rivers was so so disturbed by the succession of events

433
00:23:02,080 --> 00:23:06,159
Speaker 3: that he decided he was gonna write fifty songs before

434
00:23:06,200 --> 00:23:07,919
Speaker 3: he play live with a band again.

435
00:23:09,000 --> 00:23:11,840
Speaker 2: But don't worry, kids, he only got to around thirty.

436
00:23:12,400 --> 00:23:14,280
Speaker 2: It sounds like the songs weren't the problem, it was

437
00:23:14,320 --> 00:23:17,639
Speaker 2: the bands. But okay, whatever, that's what happens when you

438
00:23:17,720 --> 00:23:21,240
Speaker 2: have no interpersonal skills. I'm just gonna focus on me

439
00:23:21,840 --> 00:23:25,240
Speaker 2: and he enrolled at Santa Monica College and started cranking

440
00:23:25,280 --> 00:23:30,159
Speaker 2: out demos, and allegedly he also recorded an entire unreleased

441
00:23:30,320 --> 00:23:36,719
Speaker 2: vegetarian themed rap album under the name veget Terrorists around

442
00:23:36,760 --> 00:23:40,960
Speaker 2: this time, which is I think the only thing that

443
00:23:41,760 --> 00:23:44,800
Speaker 2: gives sixty wrong sausages a run for its money.

444
00:23:45,440 --> 00:23:46,000
Speaker 1: That's bad.

445
00:23:46,040 --> 00:23:48,280
Speaker 3: That's a terrible ma name. So is this making the

446
00:23:48,320 --> 00:23:49,600
Speaker 3: rounds on YouTube or anything?

447
00:23:50,520 --> 00:23:54,320
Speaker 2: No, I don't think so. According to Weezerpedia, which has

448
00:23:54,400 --> 00:24:00,400
Speaker 2: been like just a real, a real godsend writing this episode,

449
00:24:00,520 --> 00:24:01,679
Speaker 2: it's never seen the light.

450
00:24:01,560 --> 00:24:04,359
Speaker 1: Of day he's waiting for.

451
00:24:05,320 --> 00:24:08,360
Speaker 2: There is apparently a song called Black Fur in the

452
00:24:08,400 --> 00:24:14,399
Speaker 2: Hour of Chaos, which I assume means it is like

453
00:24:14,440 --> 00:24:17,560
Speaker 2: an anti fur industry thing. But that is a riff

454
00:24:17,600 --> 00:24:20,800
Speaker 2: on a public enemy song called Black Steel in the

455
00:24:20,840 --> 00:24:25,119
Speaker 2: Hour of Chaos. So maybe it's better that we don't

456
00:24:25,119 --> 00:24:26,280
Speaker 2: actually have to hear that.

457
00:24:26,400 --> 00:24:30,600
Speaker 3: Yeah that sounds awful, Yeah yeah, Cuemo told Rolling Stone

458
00:24:30,600 --> 00:24:33,240
Speaker 3: in two thousand and nine. The Sweater song was the

459
00:24:33,280 --> 00:24:36,080
Speaker 3: first Weezer song I ever wrote. Back in nineteen ninety one,

460
00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:39,160
Speaker 3: I was trying to write a Velvet Underground type song

461
00:24:39,240 --> 00:24:41,720
Speaker 3: because I was super into them, and I came up

462
00:24:41,760 --> 00:24:44,480
Speaker 3: with that guitar riff. It wasn't until years after I

463
00:24:44,520 --> 00:24:47,080
Speaker 3: wrote it that I realized it's almost a complete ripoff

464
00:24:47,440 --> 00:24:52,760
Speaker 3: of Welcome Home. Sanitarium by Metallica. It just perfectly encapsulates Weezer.

465
00:24:52,800 --> 00:24:55,560
Speaker 3: To me, you're trying to be cool like Velvet Underground,

466
00:24:55,920 --> 00:24:58,639
Speaker 3: but your metal roots just pumped through unconsciously.

467
00:24:58,920 --> 00:24:59,520
Speaker 1: That's great.

468
00:25:00,040 --> 00:25:03,359
Speaker 2: Drummer Pat Wilson recalled in John D. Lewson's book River's

469
00:25:03,480 --> 00:25:06,840
Speaker 2: Edge the Weavers the Weezer story. Just read that out

470
00:25:06,880 --> 00:25:09,320
Speaker 2: loud for the first time. It was so bad.

471
00:25:09,960 --> 00:25:10,520
Speaker 1: I love that.

472
00:25:12,520 --> 00:25:15,359
Speaker 2: You'll never step in the same river twice. The Weezer story.

473
00:25:17,880 --> 00:25:21,800
Speaker 2: Many Rivers to cross. Wow, the tale of Weezer. I

474
00:25:21,840 --> 00:25:22,840
Speaker 2: could do this all day.

475
00:25:23,520 --> 00:25:23,639
Speaker 1: Uh.

476
00:25:24,160 --> 00:25:26,520
Speaker 2: Rivers said, Look, we're gonna write fifty songs and then

477
00:25:26,520 --> 00:25:29,359
Speaker 2: we're gonna have our first rehearsal. As mentioned earlier, they

478
00:25:29,359 --> 00:25:31,760
Speaker 2: got to around thirty. My name is Jonas dates back

479
00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:33,840
Speaker 2: to around this time. Samoth Wortles turned and left me

480
00:25:33,880 --> 00:25:35,960
Speaker 2: here other stuff that would make it onto albums later

481
00:25:36,640 --> 00:25:39,879
Speaker 2: and Wilson sent some of Rivers demos to his old roommate,

482
00:25:40,000 --> 00:25:44,000
Speaker 2: bassist Matt Sharp, and I love this story. It's super cute.

483
00:25:44,680 --> 00:25:47,560
Speaker 2: Matt Sharp became obsessed with this band. He had moved

484
00:25:47,600 --> 00:25:50,040
Speaker 2: to the Bay Area and immediately moved back to la

485
00:25:50,240 --> 00:25:53,240
Speaker 2: and like appointed himself the guy who would make Weezer happen.

486
00:25:54,320 --> 00:25:56,800
Speaker 2: He told Rolling Stone. I thought, I'm doing this no

487
00:25:56,840 --> 00:25:58,840
Speaker 2: matter what has to be done to make it happen.

488
00:25:59,320 --> 00:26:02,400
Speaker 2: We're on this journe together. And this was a needed

489
00:26:02,400 --> 00:26:04,680
Speaker 2: shot in the arm for Cuomo, who recalled I think

490
00:26:04,720 --> 00:26:07,160
Speaker 2: Matt called me and said, you're a genius. I'm going

491
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:09,359
Speaker 2: to be a bass player. We're going to be a band.

492
00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:16,240
Speaker 2: It confirmed all my greatest hopes for myself. Tremendous phrase.

493
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:19,760
Speaker 2: Knowing he felt so strongly about the songs was all

494
00:26:19,800 --> 00:26:23,120
Speaker 2: the confidence I need. Another needed confidence boost came from

495
00:26:23,160 --> 00:26:25,959
Speaker 2: rivers quasi girlfriend at the time, Jennifer Chiba, who looms

496
00:26:26,119 --> 00:26:29,760
Speaker 2: large in the Weezer lore, and she introduced him to

497
00:26:29,760 --> 00:26:33,960
Speaker 2: bands like Lou Barlow's post Dinosaur Junior or concurrently with

498
00:26:34,000 --> 00:26:38,359
Speaker 2: Dinosaur Junior project, Sebido, and the Flaming Lips. And she

499
00:26:38,480 --> 00:26:41,280
Speaker 2: also crucially encouraged him to cut his hair because at

500
00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:43,880
Speaker 2: this point I think he was still rotting like extremely

501
00:26:43,920 --> 00:26:47,439
Speaker 2: long metal head or mullet hair. Yeah, and Cuomo had

502
00:26:47,480 --> 00:26:50,080
Speaker 2: actually done so well at Santa Monica that he'd gotten

503
00:26:50,119 --> 00:26:54,200
Speaker 2: a lucrative postgrad offer from UC Berkeley, so he gave

504
00:26:55,000 --> 00:26:57,840
Speaker 2: sharp like a year. He was like, ye, break this

505
00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:00,399
Speaker 2: band in a year, or I'm gonna go enroll at

506
00:27:00,480 --> 00:27:08,320
Speaker 2: UC Berkeley, which is hilarious and basically Sharp achieved this

507
00:27:08,480 --> 00:27:11,520
Speaker 2: by telling Rivers like, hey, forget about metal and grunge.

508
00:27:11,560 --> 00:27:13,159
Speaker 2: Our new thing is the Beach Boys.

509
00:27:13,960 --> 00:27:16,640
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, see this is why I love these guys.

510
00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:20,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, but Loud, Oh sorry that I forgot to even

511
00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:22,639
Speaker 2: finished the most crucial part of the pitch. Let's be

512
00:27:22,760 --> 00:27:25,439
Speaker 2: like the Beach Boys. But Loud sold.

513
00:27:25,800 --> 00:27:27,399
Speaker 1: Yeah.

514
00:27:27,520 --> 00:27:29,560
Speaker 3: Now we're going to talk about a major day in

515
00:27:29,560 --> 00:27:34,840
Speaker 3: Weezer Lore March nineteenth, nineteen ninety two. Not only did

516
00:27:34,840 --> 00:27:37,720
Speaker 3: the band play their first ever gig at Raji's on

517
00:27:37,800 --> 00:27:41,439
Speaker 3: Hollywood Boulevard as a last minute opener for wait for it,

518
00:27:41,920 --> 00:27:47,080
Speaker 3: Keanu Reeves Band Dog Star, but they also got their name.

519
00:27:48,480 --> 00:27:50,720
Speaker 3: This occurred while on a phone call with the booker

520
00:27:50,760 --> 00:27:53,280
Speaker 3: for that very gig. Rivers would later say, I kept

521
00:27:53,320 --> 00:27:56,199
Speaker 3: harassing this guy Casey at Raji's in Hollywood to give

522
00:27:56,280 --> 00:27:58,920
Speaker 3: us a gig. Finally, one day he called and said,

523
00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:02,960
Speaker 3: the opening band for Keanu Reeves Band Dog Stars just canceled.

524
00:28:03,560 --> 00:28:06,080
Speaker 3: Do you guys want to play? And I said yes,

525
00:28:06,920 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 3: And so he said what do you guys called. We

526
00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:11,080
Speaker 3: didn't have a name yet, so I told them we

527
00:28:11,119 --> 00:28:14,119
Speaker 3: were called Weezer, which was my dad's nickname for me.

528
00:28:14,840 --> 00:28:17,640
Speaker 3: When I told the guys, hey, guess what we're called Weezer,

529
00:28:18,160 --> 00:28:23,440
Speaker 3: they weren't super excited about it. Interesting, I never really

530
00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:25,440
Speaker 3: thought it, because I've definitely heard the story before, but

531
00:28:25,520 --> 00:28:29,320
Speaker 3: I've never really thought about the implications of naming your

532
00:28:29,320 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 3: band the nickname from your estranged father.

533
00:28:35,080 --> 00:28:38,720
Speaker 1: Yeah. Super weird. That's a lot to unpack, Huh.

534
00:28:39,440 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 2: It's like naming your band Old Yeller or something.

535
00:28:43,000 --> 00:28:45,560
Speaker 1: Ah.

536
00:28:45,600 --> 00:28:49,640
Speaker 2: Hey, everyone, We're Lenny from of Mice and Men, just

537
00:28:49,680 --> 00:28:52,080
Speaker 2: like famous sad stories.

538
00:28:54,920 --> 00:28:58,280
Speaker 3: Adding to the moment, the band also obtained their longtime

539
00:28:58,320 --> 00:29:03,120
Speaker 3: headquarters on Amherst Cuomo and Sharp moved in with friend

540
00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:05,800
Speaker 3: Justin Fisher after convincing the landlords that they were a

541
00:29:05,800 --> 00:29:10,040
Speaker 3: group of UCLA film students and emphatically not a noisy

542
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:13,400
Speaker 3: rock band. The focal point of the house quickly became

543
00:29:13,480 --> 00:29:17,280
Speaker 3: the garage, which was promptly transformed into a rehearsal space

544
00:29:17,680 --> 00:29:20,160
Speaker 3: and be decked with posters that would define the blue

545
00:29:20,200 --> 00:29:23,880
Speaker 3: albums in the garage. What follow up next was a

546
00:29:23,880 --> 00:29:26,760
Speaker 3: period of slogging it out in La among the detritus

547
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:30,520
Speaker 3: of the hair metal scene and the grunge Explosion, which

548
00:29:30,520 --> 00:29:32,520
Speaker 3: a band full of guys who looked like record store

549
00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:36,200
Speaker 3: clerk's playing high volume power pop wasn't the most natural

550
00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:39,600
Speaker 3: fit for drummer. Pat Wilson wound up living in a

551
00:29:39,640 --> 00:29:43,040
Speaker 3: garage with no running water, where he probably recalled the

552
00:29:43,120 --> 00:29:49,200
Speaker 3: rolling stone in a bag, not even a bucket, not

553
00:29:49,280 --> 00:29:50,680
Speaker 3: even a box, a bag.

554
00:29:51,280 --> 00:29:54,960
Speaker 2: He seems like a weird guy. When Brian Bell joined

555
00:29:55,240 --> 00:29:59,400
Speaker 2: right after they fired Jason, he said that the he

556
00:29:59,800 --> 00:30:02,720
Speaker 2: went and met Rivers at the hotel and rivers first

557
00:30:02,720 --> 00:30:04,720
Speaker 2: word to him, He's like, you're going to need to

558
00:30:04,720 --> 00:30:07,200
Speaker 2: grow mustache to be in this band. We're all gonna

559
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:12,800
Speaker 2: have mustaches, and Brin Belt was like really, Rivers was like, no,

560
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 2: but grow it anyway. And then he went to introduce

561
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:18,240
Speaker 2: himself to Pat Wilson, and Pat Wilson was moved, like,

562
00:30:18,360 --> 00:30:20,320
Speaker 2: had his pants down and was mooning him as he

563
00:30:20,360 --> 00:30:23,120
Speaker 2: came in the door. Ah, weird band.

564
00:30:24,480 --> 00:30:26,280
Speaker 3: You were ahead of our band. I'm sort of surprised

565
00:30:26,280 --> 00:30:28,040
Speaker 3: you didn't make us well. You you asked us to

566
00:30:28,040 --> 00:30:32,320
Speaker 3: wear like Hawaiian shirts, yeah, or like striped shirts.

567
00:30:32,320 --> 00:30:34,120
Speaker 2: That was like five years into the band when I

568
00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:36,240
Speaker 2: was like, everyone just start wearing Hawaiian shirts.

569
00:30:36,880 --> 00:30:38,640
Speaker 1: And we did. And it was good.

570
00:30:39,320 --> 00:30:44,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, in the biblical sense it was good. Not in

571
00:30:44,440 --> 00:30:46,600
Speaker 3: the biblical We did not just to everyone listening. We

572
00:30:46,640 --> 00:30:48,280
Speaker 3: did not know each other in the biblical sense.

573
00:30:48,920 --> 00:30:52,880
Speaker 1: No, what the hell are you doing now? The bag

574
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:53,360
Speaker 1: left off.

575
00:30:53,600 --> 00:30:58,040
Speaker 3: In the meanwhile, Cuemo doubled down on his ultimatum to

576
00:30:58,080 --> 00:31:00,520
Speaker 3: his bassist. He said, you get us, could deal in

577
00:31:00,640 --> 00:31:02,840
Speaker 3: nine months, or I'm going back to school.

578
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:04,000
Speaker 1: Damn.

579
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:05,480
Speaker 2: Things were easier back then.

580
00:31:05,760 --> 00:31:09,120
Speaker 1: Ah. Consequently, by November, Weezer.

581
00:31:08,840 --> 00:31:10,800
Speaker 2: Had recorded a demo that made it into the hands

582
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:14,000
Speaker 2: of Todd Sullivan, an A and R guy Geffen, which

583
00:31:14,080 --> 00:31:16,719
Speaker 2: became the lone major label to show interest in Weezer,

584
00:31:16,840 --> 00:31:20,280
Speaker 2: although they did have some biddings from a number of indies.

585
00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:23,640
Speaker 2: After securing a deal with the Geffen subsidiary DGC in

586
00:31:23,760 --> 00:31:26,400
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety three, Weezer planned to act as their own

587
00:31:26,480 --> 00:31:29,960
Speaker 2: producers and recorded their longtime home on Amherst Avenue in

588
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:33,840
Speaker 2: the Sawtel district of La their cozy garage had been

589
00:31:33,920 --> 00:31:37,240
Speaker 2: where they cut a number of demos, and consequently bassist

590
00:31:37,280 --> 00:31:40,000
Speaker 2: Matt Sharp said in November nineteen ninety four interview. Our

591
00:31:40,040 --> 00:31:41,480
Speaker 2: first thought was that we should do it in our

592
00:31:41,520 --> 00:31:43,720
Speaker 2: own element and have nothing be different, and make it

593
00:31:43,840 --> 00:31:46,280
Speaker 2: as little of an experience as possible. Do it in

594
00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:48,840
Speaker 2: LA and we'll produce ourselves and get an engineer. We

595
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:50,920
Speaker 2: like to do it that way, but the Geffen A

596
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:53,160
Speaker 2: and R team had bigger ideas and urged the band

597
00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:57,080
Speaker 2: to hire an established name to oversee the sessions. Cuomo

598
00:31:57,120 --> 00:31:59,160
Speaker 2: happened to be in a supermarket where he overheard the

599
00:31:59,240 --> 00:32:02,640
Speaker 2: Cars All Time Great, one of the greatest songs of

600
00:32:02,680 --> 00:32:05,240
Speaker 2: all time. Just what I needed, he explained. On the

601
00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:07,960
Speaker 2: worst podcast name I've ever heard in my life. I

602
00:32:08,000 --> 00:32:10,920
Speaker 2: think it's music or guitar themed, hosted by Chris Shifflett,

603
00:32:10,960 --> 00:32:15,240
Speaker 2: called Shred with Shifty, mostly because I remember the lead

604
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:18,400
Speaker 2: singer of crazy Town's name was Shifty shell Shock, so

605
00:32:18,480 --> 00:32:19,520
Speaker 2: that's all I can think of now.

606
00:32:19,680 --> 00:32:20,240
Speaker 1: Oh wow.

607
00:32:21,200 --> 00:32:24,000
Speaker 2: So anyway, he told Shifty, I was like, Yeah, that's

608
00:32:24,120 --> 00:32:26,040
Speaker 2: kind of what I want the Weezer record to sound like,

609
00:32:26,280 --> 00:32:29,440
Speaker 2: So let's get that guy. The record company was really

610
00:32:29,480 --> 00:32:31,520
Speaker 2: pushing us to work with the producer, Cuomo told their

611
00:32:31,560 --> 00:32:34,200
Speaker 2: biographer Larsen, and so we figured, I don't know how

612
00:32:34,240 --> 00:32:37,840
Speaker 2: you pronounced that guy's name, Lewison. Lewison works for me,

613
00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:40,800
Speaker 2: So we figured that if we had to have somebody

614
00:32:40,840 --> 00:32:42,360
Speaker 2: in the studio with us, it might as well just

615
00:32:42,440 --> 00:32:44,840
Speaker 2: be someone who writes good songs. And the Car's first

616
00:32:44,920 --> 00:32:48,840
Speaker 2: record just rules. That's Matt Sharp speaking. We got into

617
00:32:48,880 --> 00:32:51,320
Speaker 2: the early Cars thing and began to notice a musical

618
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:54,800
Speaker 2: similarity between us and them. Our use of chords, downstrokes,

619
00:32:54,840 --> 00:32:57,320
Speaker 2: and melodies shows the same economy and tightness as a

620
00:32:57,360 --> 00:33:00,520
Speaker 2: Cars song. Buddy Holly is not that far off from

621
00:33:00,680 --> 00:33:03,000
Speaker 2: just what I needed. Lucky for the fledgling band, the

622
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:06,120
Speaker 2: feeling was mutual. I got their tapes from Geffen Records

623
00:33:06,120 --> 00:33:08,640
Speaker 2: when I was out in LA working another project. Cars

624
00:33:08,800 --> 00:33:12,320
Speaker 2: songwriter and producer Rick Okasik told Magnet in twenty fourteen,

625
00:33:13,200 --> 00:33:14,600
Speaker 2: I listened to it in the car and I just

626
00:33:14,680 --> 00:33:17,280
Speaker 2: thought it was phenomenal. Having no idea what they looked like,

627
00:33:17,440 --> 00:33:19,040
Speaker 2: I thought they were a heavy metal band that had

628
00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:22,600
Speaker 2: really good melodies. Okaysick was in town working on Bad

629
00:33:22,640 --> 00:33:25,760
Speaker 2: Brains God of Love album and decided to visit Weezer

630
00:33:25,800 --> 00:33:30,280
Speaker 2: at their rehearsal space. Hilarious and fascinating footnote to Okay

631
00:33:30,360 --> 00:33:33,200
Speaker 2: six careers that he was the Bad Brains producer. Bad Brands,

632
00:33:33,240 --> 00:33:34,800
Speaker 2: for those of you who are not aware, are the

633
00:33:34,920 --> 00:33:38,479
Speaker 2: most virtuosic hardcore punk band out of the eighties. They

634
00:33:38,520 --> 00:33:41,600
Speaker 2: were a bunch of African American gentlemen who grew up

635
00:33:41,640 --> 00:33:44,640
Speaker 2: steeped in reggae and then became jazz fusion dorks listening

636
00:33:44,680 --> 00:33:48,320
Speaker 2: to like Weather Report and Return Forever and then found

637
00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:51,240
Speaker 2: the Ramones like after that and were like, I didn't know,

638
00:33:51,280 --> 00:33:54,160
Speaker 2: but we can do this, yeah, yeah, And so they

639
00:33:54,240 --> 00:33:58,280
Speaker 2: were like they like late seventies too, like early eighties,

640
00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:00,480
Speaker 2: and they were like, yeah, we can, we can do this,

641
00:34:00,680 --> 00:34:04,760
Speaker 2: and we'll just make it Shred and Rick Okaseik produced

642
00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:08,520
Speaker 2: their album Rock for Light, and I guess was still

643
00:34:08,560 --> 00:34:11,239
Speaker 2: hanging out with him into the early nineties, which is

644
00:34:11,320 --> 00:34:14,479
Speaker 2: just amazing. The record company called us up and said,

645
00:34:14,600 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 2: Rick's coming to your rehearsal today. Matt Sharp said in

646
00:34:17,520 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 2: July nineteen ninety four interview, we were like, yeah, right,

647
00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:23,120
Speaker 2: he's coming to our rehearsal. But that day our drummer

648
00:34:23,239 --> 00:34:25,480
Speaker 2: Pat saw him in a guitar store and he goes,

649
00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:28,480
Speaker 2: oh my god, maybe he is coming in anticipation of

650
00:34:28,560 --> 00:34:31,360
Speaker 2: Okay Sick's arrival, Weezer made a special addition to their repertoire.

651
00:34:32,080 --> 00:34:34,919
Speaker 2: We had prepared a cover of just what I needed first.

652
00:34:35,000 --> 00:34:38,080
Speaker 2: Weezer guitarist Jason Cropper remembered, you know, sort of just

653
00:34:38,160 --> 00:34:40,560
Speaker 2: goofing around and honoring him at the same time, and

654
00:34:40,680 --> 00:34:43,360
Speaker 2: Okay Sick later admitted that he found their impromptu tribute

655
00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:47,000
Speaker 2: quote pretty cute. Okay Sick must have been so scary.

656
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:51,799
Speaker 2: He's like six five ninety pounds, looks like the grim Reaper,

657
00:34:51,880 --> 00:34:53,040
Speaker 2: always wearing sunglasses.

658
00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:55,960
Speaker 3: He may have been scary, but he was pretty laid back,

659
00:34:56,360 --> 00:34:58,600
Speaker 3: and he quickly allayed any fears that the BAM may

660
00:34:58,640 --> 00:35:02,000
Speaker 3: have had about handing over the producer role to an outsider.

661
00:35:03,120 --> 00:35:05,560
Speaker 3: He says in River's Edge. My impression was just that

662
00:35:05,600 --> 00:35:08,399
Speaker 3: they should be recorded the way they were. I didn't

663
00:35:08,400 --> 00:35:11,000
Speaker 3: want to tamper with it much. He did, however, have

664
00:35:11,080 --> 00:35:14,640
Speaker 3: one suggestion, a not bad one. Get out of the garage.

665
00:35:16,000 --> 00:35:18,280
Speaker 3: I talked them into coming to New York and recording

666
00:35:18,280 --> 00:35:21,879
Speaker 3: an Electric Lady. I thought it would be inspiring, get

667
00:35:21,920 --> 00:35:25,760
Speaker 3: out of this garage and into what's on the short

668
00:35:25,840 --> 00:35:30,359
Speaker 3: list of the most iconic studios and yeah, Rick Bill, Okay, Yeah,

669
00:35:31,440 --> 00:35:33,400
Speaker 3: I guess. Another reason Okaysik wanted to go to New

670
00:35:33,480 --> 00:35:37,600
Speaker 3: York was that his then wife Paulina Poritzkova, the supermodel,

671
00:35:37,760 --> 00:35:40,120
Speaker 3: was pregnant with the couple's first son at the time,

672
00:35:40,239 --> 00:35:42,040
Speaker 3: so he wanted to be close to her as well.

673
00:35:42,239 --> 00:35:44,120
Speaker 3: So the night before the band decamped to New York

674
00:35:44,160 --> 00:35:46,839
Speaker 3: City to record at Electric Lady Studios, they did one

675
00:35:46,920 --> 00:35:51,400
Speaker 3: last thing in their garage. They raged, specifically at August seventh,

676
00:35:51,560 --> 00:35:56,359
Speaker 3: nineteen ninety three. Carl Koch aka the Fifth Wheezer, later

677
00:35:56,480 --> 00:35:59,000
Speaker 3: wrote of this magical evening in the garage right before

678
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:01,880
Speaker 3: they left for New York. The excitement and giddiness was

679
00:36:02,000 --> 00:36:06,439
Speaker 3: tangible and erupted into a going away bash. Needless to say,

680
00:36:06,800 --> 00:36:09,880
Speaker 3: the party stretched into the weeest of hours. We were

681
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:13,839
Speaker 3: awoken after about forty five minutes sleep by dgc's David

682
00:36:13,880 --> 00:36:17,680
Speaker 3: Geffen Record Companies Denise McDonald, who picked us up in

683
00:36:17,800 --> 00:36:21,640
Speaker 3: label exec Tom Zutto's range Rover and took our ragged

684
00:36:21,760 --> 00:36:23,040
Speaker 3: forms to Lax.

685
00:36:23,640 --> 00:36:25,839
Speaker 1: I think Carl Koch is like the band diarist if

686
00:36:25,880 --> 00:36:27,560
Speaker 1: I recall, Yeah, he's just like.

687
00:36:27,600 --> 00:36:30,440
Speaker 2: One of their buddies, in like their historian. I like

688
00:36:30,560 --> 00:36:33,080
Speaker 2: he like works behind the scenes, but he's also like

689
00:36:33,400 --> 00:36:36,560
Speaker 2: in the street. He's also heard on Blue album. Oh right,

690
00:36:36,640 --> 00:36:40,040
Speaker 2: it's just kind of a man. That's their man Friday,

691
00:36:40,600 --> 00:36:42,680
Speaker 2: which is why I referred him as the fifth Weezer,

692
00:36:44,080 --> 00:36:44,840
Speaker 2: the fifth Weeze.

693
00:36:46,920 --> 00:36:50,160
Speaker 3: One of the label representatives, Denise McDonald, took great care

694
00:36:51,000 --> 00:36:56,280
Speaker 3: to step over unconscious figures asleep on the lawn. Their departure,

695
00:36:56,400 --> 00:36:59,920
Speaker 3: mercifully wasn't delayed by the discovery that the residences won

696
00:37:00,160 --> 00:37:03,600
Speaker 3: and only toilet have them pulverized at some point during

697
00:37:03,640 --> 00:37:07,399
Speaker 3: the night, and presumably Pat Wilson was like, I got

698
00:37:07,440 --> 00:37:12,000
Speaker 3: a bag, only been used a few times.

699
00:37:12,719 --> 00:37:18,640
Speaker 2: As you meditate on that, we'll be right back with

700
00:37:18,800 --> 00:37:31,680
Speaker 2: more too much information after these messages, Wow, okay, So

701
00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:34,000
Speaker 2: spend some time routining the band at a New York

702
00:37:34,040 --> 00:37:37,400
Speaker 2: rehearsal studio. He told their biographer, I had them in

703
00:37:37,440 --> 00:37:39,759
Speaker 2: a pre production for at least a week, trimming it down.

704
00:37:40,239 --> 00:37:42,120
Speaker 2: I wanted it to be a concise record that had

705
00:37:42,120 --> 00:37:46,400
Speaker 2: a focal point. They attempted fifteen songs during these early sessions,

706
00:37:46,440 --> 00:37:49,000
Speaker 2: including the ten that made the final cut. Michael and

707
00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:50,920
Speaker 2: Carly became one of the most famous of these. It

708
00:37:51,000 --> 00:37:53,279
Speaker 2: was re recorded in its official forum, but you can

709
00:37:53,360 --> 00:37:57,200
Speaker 2: hear the demos on one of the Insane Long Blue

710
00:37:57,200 --> 00:38:02,279
Speaker 2: album reissues. We will get to that. It's very sad.

711
00:38:03,400 --> 00:38:06,880
Speaker 3: When they hit the hollid halls of Electric Lady Rivers

712
00:38:07,040 --> 00:38:10,440
Speaker 3: was suitably cowed. He told the La Times this year.

713
00:38:10,800 --> 00:38:12,600
Speaker 3: I was beside myself.

714
00:38:14,360 --> 00:38:20,080
Speaker 1: Because I knew Kiss had recorded there. Na Hendricks. Kiss

715
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:23,000
Speaker 1: was the one that he named dropped. I remember going

716
00:38:23,080 --> 00:38:23,239
Speaker 1: to the.

717
00:38:23,280 --> 00:38:26,600
Speaker 3: Bathroom for the first time thinking Ace Freeley sat on

718
00:38:26,680 --> 00:38:29,520
Speaker 3: this toilet that I'm about to sit on. Honestly, I

719
00:38:29,640 --> 00:38:32,160
Speaker 3: did that when I went to Village Vanguard and thought

720
00:38:32,160 --> 00:38:36,440
Speaker 3: about everybody old famous asses that had shot up. I

721
00:38:36,520 --> 00:38:37,759
Speaker 3: think I took a picture of it and sent it

722
00:38:37,800 --> 00:38:39,239
Speaker 3: to you. If I recall you did I did?

723
00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:40,279
Speaker 1: Okay good. Yeah.

724
00:38:41,040 --> 00:38:43,640
Speaker 2: The bandon Okasik put some outlines in place for the album.

725
00:38:43,800 --> 00:38:46,480
Speaker 2: There was to be no reverb, the guitars were to

726
00:38:46,600 --> 00:38:51,400
Speaker 2: play only downstrokes Wow, there would be no effects pedals used.

727
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:55,280
Speaker 2: He asked them to switch to their guitars bridge pickups,

728
00:38:55,680 --> 00:38:58,840
Speaker 2: which gives generally a brighter, more troubly sound than the

729
00:38:58,960 --> 00:39:02,959
Speaker 2: neck and the band also gained access to Okay six

730
00:39:03,000 --> 00:39:05,919
Speaker 2: collection of vintage guitars, among them a few less pulled

731
00:39:06,040 --> 00:39:10,880
Speaker 2: Junior Specials and a red sixties Fender Jaguar. There's been

732
00:39:10,880 --> 00:39:13,520
Speaker 2: a lot of debate amongst Weezer nerds about which guitar

733
00:39:13,960 --> 00:39:17,040
Speaker 2: actually tracked the album because Rivers is famous for a

734
00:39:17,120 --> 00:39:20,719
Speaker 2: blue stratocaster like a Franken Caster that he has, but

735
00:39:21,280 --> 00:39:24,640
Speaker 2: Jason Cropper had a red stratocaster that people often think

736
00:39:24,760 --> 00:39:27,080
Speaker 2: is on the record, but it is I believe has

737
00:39:27,120 --> 00:39:30,560
Speaker 2: been settled to be mostly okay, six guitars. Uh, this

738
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,520
Speaker 2: is my favorite bit about how they did this record.

739
00:39:33,600 --> 00:39:37,400
Speaker 2: They tracked everything by keeping the gain, which is like

740
00:39:37,600 --> 00:39:41,759
Speaker 2: the the input level that's going into an amplifier, right,

741
00:39:41,960 --> 00:39:46,879
Speaker 2: Like it's it's essentially how you turn the signal that's

742
00:39:46,960 --> 00:39:48,200
Speaker 2: going into something.

743
00:39:48,480 --> 00:39:53,319
Speaker 1: Up until he gets distorted or something there.

744
00:39:53,480 --> 00:39:56,160
Speaker 2: Well, Sue, I mean, god, how do I explain this?

745
00:39:57,160 --> 00:40:01,120
Speaker 2: On amplifiers and most audio equipment, there's gain and then

746
00:40:01,160 --> 00:40:02,240
Speaker 2: there's master volume.

747
00:40:02,480 --> 00:40:03,680
Speaker 1: Right, Gain just.

748
00:40:04,400 --> 00:40:09,040
Speaker 2: Increases the input of whatever you're putting into the device.

749
00:40:09,560 --> 00:40:14,480
Speaker 2: Master volume takes that signal and turns it up. And yeah,

750
00:40:14,520 --> 00:40:17,879
Speaker 2: and the just the actual volume of what you're hearing,

751
00:40:18,120 --> 00:40:20,360
Speaker 2: the way that those old tube Bamps worked was that

752
00:40:20,480 --> 00:40:23,120
Speaker 2: they had a really interesting relationship between gain and volume

753
00:40:23,200 --> 00:40:26,319
Speaker 2: because of the relationship between the power tubes that were

754
00:40:26,400 --> 00:40:29,920
Speaker 2: driving the amplifire, so you could what they did on

755
00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:34,360
Speaker 2: this record was crank the gain, so you get that chewy,

756
00:40:34,719 --> 00:40:37,600
Speaker 2: like thick crunch distortion out of it. But then they

757
00:40:37,680 --> 00:40:41,120
Speaker 2: actually set the master volume very very low, so you're

758
00:40:41,200 --> 00:40:44,240
Speaker 2: getting all of that tone, but it's not out of control.

759
00:40:44,719 --> 00:40:47,840
Speaker 2: And then you're playing with you know, downstrokes. There's no reverbs,

760
00:40:47,880 --> 00:40:50,840
Speaker 2: so it's all that distortion, but very crisp and like controlled.

761
00:40:51,080 --> 00:40:52,759
Speaker 3: I mean the sound that I'm thinking of, I mean,

762
00:40:52,800 --> 00:40:55,359
Speaker 3: I'm nowhere near as technical about this as you are,

763
00:40:55,480 --> 00:40:58,239
Speaker 3: but think of the opening to Buddy Holly, just that just.

764
00:41:00,120 --> 00:41:02,160
Speaker 1: That big wall of guitars strumming.

765
00:41:02,800 --> 00:41:02,920
Speaker 3: Oh.

766
00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:05,440
Speaker 2: And it's fascinating what they did, how they thought of it,

767
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:07,440
Speaker 2: you know. And this is one of their engineer. The

768
00:41:07,520 --> 00:41:10,080
Speaker 2: engineers on Blue Album guy named Chris Shaw. He said

769
00:41:10,200 --> 00:41:13,400
Speaker 2: there was one overriding concept to the album, the idea

770
00:41:13,480 --> 00:41:16,200
Speaker 2: that the guitars and the bass were one huge ten

771
00:41:16,320 --> 00:41:19,719
Speaker 2: string instrument. There's very few songs on the record that

772
00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:22,200
Speaker 2: actually have a bassline that drifts away from what the

773
00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:25,840
Speaker 2: guitar is doing, so everything was in this lock step

774
00:41:26,040 --> 00:41:30,120
Speaker 2: to create these big walls of hugely distorted sound. And

775
00:41:30,160 --> 00:41:31,839
Speaker 2: another thing that they did that I thought was really

776
00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:34,400
Speaker 2: interesting that I only learned about on This is what

777
00:41:35,160 --> 00:41:39,000
Speaker 2: it's They called an inverted power chord, but that's just

778
00:41:39,080 --> 00:41:42,359
Speaker 2: an overly over complicated way of talking about a power

779
00:41:42,480 --> 00:41:47,840
Speaker 2: chord was introduced by I think link Ray, oh maybe,

780
00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:51,080
Speaker 2: but it gained prominence in the fifties, right because like

781
00:41:51,560 --> 00:41:54,000
Speaker 2: when people started cranking their amps in the fifties, link

782
00:41:54,080 --> 00:41:56,040
Speaker 2: Ray and Dave Davies on you really got me and

783
00:41:56,120 --> 00:41:58,920
Speaker 2: creating the kind of template for guitar distortion. One of

784
00:41:58,960 --> 00:42:01,680
Speaker 2: the things that they found it got really muddy really

785
00:42:01,760 --> 00:42:04,680
Speaker 2: quick when you were using traditional chords or like what

786
00:42:04,760 --> 00:42:07,040
Speaker 2: they call cowboy chords down at the bottom of the neck,

787
00:42:07,280 --> 00:42:10,440
Speaker 2: or even bar chords thicker up. So they simplified all

788
00:42:10,480 --> 00:42:12,799
Speaker 2: of that by having chords that only had a root,

789
00:42:12,920 --> 00:42:16,920
Speaker 2: a fifth, and an octave, which are the most consonant

790
00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:20,200
Speaker 2: intervals you can have in the Western tempered scale because

791
00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:24,000
Speaker 2: they don't introduce the same harmonic inconsistencies into the waveform

792
00:42:24,040 --> 00:42:28,480
Speaker 2: that a third does. Anyway, you play a power chord

793
00:42:28,560 --> 00:42:32,480
Speaker 2: with essentially just three fingers or even two on a guitar.

794
00:42:32,640 --> 00:42:34,719
Speaker 2: And Weezer's thing that they did on this album was

795
00:42:34,920 --> 00:42:37,360
Speaker 2: instead of playing power chords on the bottom string, the

796
00:42:37,400 --> 00:42:39,680
Speaker 2: thickest string of the guitar, the lowest one, the lowe

797
00:42:40,680 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 2: like Tony Eomi did in Sabbath, all the power chords

798
00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:46,680
Speaker 2: are played on the low e string to make it

799
00:42:46,800 --> 00:42:49,520
Speaker 2: just sound lower at all times. So what they did

800
00:42:49,640 --> 00:42:51,640
Speaker 2: was they would play these power chords on the A string,

801
00:42:51,680 --> 00:42:54,000
Speaker 2: which is the second lowest string, and then just bar

802
00:42:55,280 --> 00:42:58,400
Speaker 2: the note under it on the E string. So basically

803
00:42:58,480 --> 00:43:02,840
Speaker 2: you have a chord that's just two fifths and two roots.

804
00:43:03,719 --> 00:43:06,520
Speaker 2: It is just basically the non musical nerd explanation for

805
00:43:06,600 --> 00:43:11,360
Speaker 2: this is it makes the chords sound thicker and louder. Anyway,

806
00:43:11,440 --> 00:43:14,279
Speaker 2: I don't know that's cool. Probably didn't come across well.

807
00:43:15,239 --> 00:43:17,840
Speaker 2: And then they just decided to mix it all super loud.

808
00:43:18,880 --> 00:43:22,880
Speaker 2: Their template was the guitars on Radioheads Creep, so they

809
00:43:22,920 --> 00:43:25,560
Speaker 2: were like, the guitars must be as loud or louder

810
00:43:25,640 --> 00:43:29,560
Speaker 2: than this relative to the mix Creep precated.

811
00:43:29,719 --> 00:43:32,640
Speaker 1: Blahh, I guess it must doesn't creep ninety two.

812
00:43:33,520 --> 00:43:35,279
Speaker 2: They were one of the Bends by ninety five.

813
00:43:35,960 --> 00:43:36,439
Speaker 1: That's true.

814
00:43:37,320 --> 00:43:39,719
Speaker 3: All that said, there's still one thing that got away

815
00:43:39,760 --> 00:43:44,200
Speaker 3: from them during the recording The Accursed Human Element. Guitarist

816
00:43:44,280 --> 00:43:47,920
Speaker 3: Jason Cropper from the band's days as sixty Wrong Sausage Is,

817
00:43:48,000 --> 00:43:50,640
Speaker 3: How dare you keep making me say that, claims he

818
00:43:50,800 --> 00:43:53,320
Speaker 3: was fired by the band during recording because of his

819
00:43:53,440 --> 00:43:56,680
Speaker 3: relationship with his then girlfriend now ex wife.

820
00:43:57,000 --> 00:43:59,799
Speaker 1: Who was unpopular with his bandmates.

821
00:44:00,239 --> 00:44:02,800
Speaker 2: I mean poor woman. Yeah, honestly, Oh I know.

822
00:44:03,640 --> 00:44:07,440
Speaker 3: Carrokoch later told Magnet magazine Jason had a girlfriend back

823
00:44:07,520 --> 00:44:10,040
Speaker 3: in LA and one day she called him and said, oh,

824
00:44:10,160 --> 00:44:13,959
Speaker 3: I'm pregnant. And from that day onward, Jason's personality became

825
00:44:14,080 --> 00:44:17,600
Speaker 3: really intense and frantic and no kidding, he wasn't handling

826
00:44:17,640 --> 00:44:20,080
Speaker 3: it well. A couple times the band would pull him

827
00:44:20,080 --> 00:44:22,520
Speaker 3: aside and be like, are you okay? Are you sure

828
00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:25,040
Speaker 3: you can do this? And he always said he was fine,

829
00:44:25,239 --> 00:44:27,120
Speaker 3: but then twenty minutes later he'd be up on the

830
00:44:27,160 --> 00:44:32,120
Speaker 3: roof of Electric Ladies screaming or something. The final straw

831
00:44:32,360 --> 00:44:35,359
Speaker 3: was when defining Cuomo's no girlfriends who were recording at

832
00:44:35,360 --> 00:44:39,319
Speaker 3: the studio rule ooh, Jason Cropper's girlfriend flew to New

833
00:44:39,400 --> 00:44:41,480
Speaker 3: York unannounced with no place to stay.

834
00:44:42,680 --> 00:44:45,080
Speaker 1: I think the band were all staying in one place,

835
00:44:45,200 --> 00:44:46,680
Speaker 1: if I recall, I think they.

836
00:44:46,600 --> 00:44:47,160
Speaker 2: Were in a hotel.

837
00:44:47,320 --> 00:44:50,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, This all came to a very predictable head.

838
00:44:51,280 --> 00:44:54,520
Speaker 3: Treper Cuomo felt that Cropper was about to leave Weezer anyway,

839
00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:57,040
Speaker 3: so they figured they just beat him to the punch

840
00:44:57,160 --> 00:45:00,160
Speaker 3: and remove him before the release of their debut, and

841
00:45:00,200 --> 00:45:02,640
Speaker 3: according to Cropper, at one point Rivers told them he

842
00:45:02,760 --> 00:45:05,879
Speaker 3: could not allow him to jeopardize the work and ask

843
00:45:05,960 --> 00:45:08,759
Speaker 3: them to leave on the day the first mix of

844
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:12,720
Speaker 3: the record was completed. In fact, and the bitterness lasted

845
00:45:12,880 --> 00:45:16,720
Speaker 3: for several decades but has since faded. In twenty fourteen,

846
00:45:16,800 --> 00:45:19,400
Speaker 3: Cropper admitted that Rivers had made the right decision.

847
00:45:19,600 --> 00:45:22,239
Speaker 2: There's a theme in this band. It hasn't continued for

848
00:45:22,320 --> 00:45:24,920
Speaker 2: a while. Fortunately they've hung under the same stable, I

849
00:45:24,960 --> 00:45:29,160
Speaker 2: should say. But I think both Matt Sharp and Jason

850
00:45:29,360 --> 00:45:32,880
Speaker 2: have said before time healed all wounds that they were like.

851
00:45:34,280 --> 00:45:37,080
Speaker 2: Rivers will say that I left, but I was fired,

852
00:45:37,360 --> 00:45:39,800
Speaker 2: So I think Matt Sharp was too busy with his

853
00:45:39,920 --> 00:45:44,120
Speaker 2: side project among other things. But like, yeah, I mean,

854
00:45:44,160 --> 00:45:48,040
Speaker 2: you're working with an autodid act with dad issues, so

855
00:45:49,239 --> 00:45:50,000
Speaker 2: get what you pay.

856
00:45:49,920 --> 00:45:52,280
Speaker 1: For and then Asiah Complex I would guess.

857
00:45:54,880 --> 00:45:56,680
Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean they've both come out of the

858
00:45:56,719 --> 00:46:01,239
Speaker 2: other end pretty sanguine about it, which is nice. I guess,

859
00:46:01,360 --> 00:46:06,719
Speaker 2: no long standing bitterness unless they signed papers. Oh, they

860
00:46:06,760 --> 00:46:09,920
Speaker 2: definitely signed papers. I mean there was definitely. I think

861
00:46:10,000 --> 00:46:13,320
Speaker 2: at one point either Cropper or Sharp made reference to

862
00:46:13,360 --> 00:46:17,800
Speaker 2: an Nda. Oh yeah. It is fascinating, like when you

863
00:46:17,880 --> 00:46:20,799
Speaker 2: get to this era of band, when you know there

864
00:46:20,880 --> 00:46:22,759
Speaker 2: was real money being thrown around and then you would

865
00:46:22,760 --> 00:46:25,440
Speaker 2: have to incorporate the band and like the band becomes

866
00:46:25,520 --> 00:46:27,279
Speaker 2: a business and then you can pull people on and

867
00:46:27,360 --> 00:46:28,120
Speaker 2: off the payroll.

868
00:46:28,800 --> 00:46:28,960
Speaker 1: You know.

869
00:46:29,040 --> 00:46:31,160
Speaker 2: The whole machinery of these bands is so fascinating to

870
00:46:31,239 --> 00:46:35,000
Speaker 2: me because, like I know, Motley Crue has like fired

871
00:46:35,520 --> 00:46:40,040
Speaker 2: their guitarist and are denying him credit. Bon Jovi is

872
00:46:40,120 --> 00:46:44,320
Speaker 2: famously like ruled by John with an iron fist, And

873
00:46:45,040 --> 00:46:46,640
Speaker 2: it's all this stuff that people don't really think about

874
00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:48,560
Speaker 2: when they think about like, oh, yeah, you're gonna have

875
00:46:48,640 --> 00:46:49,280
Speaker 2: like we're gonna.

876
00:46:49,120 --> 00:46:49,440
Speaker 1: Have a band.

877
00:46:49,480 --> 00:46:51,359
Speaker 2: It's gonna be like a street gang and we're gonna

878
00:46:51,360 --> 00:46:53,120
Speaker 2: be cool and play music. And it's like no, there

879
00:46:53,120 --> 00:46:54,799
Speaker 2: will be a lot of paperwork, and then you will

880
00:46:54,840 --> 00:46:56,640
Speaker 2: have to deal with someone's health insurance, and then you

881
00:46:56,640 --> 00:46:58,680
Speaker 2: will be put in the position of firing them at

882
00:46:58,760 --> 00:47:02,520
Speaker 2: some point. So enjoy next time you're getting together with

883
00:47:02,600 --> 00:47:04,600
Speaker 2: your pals and dreaming with guitars.

884
00:47:07,400 --> 00:47:10,280
Speaker 3: What was I saying, Well, this is after the departure

885
00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:12,960
Speaker 3: of Jason Cropp with a guitarist. This left a very

886
00:47:13,040 --> 00:47:17,000
Speaker 3: guitar heavy band without a second guitarist slash backing vocalist.

887
00:47:17,719 --> 00:47:20,400
Speaker 1: So we's a recruited a guy named Brian Bell just in.

888
00:47:20,480 --> 00:47:22,640
Speaker 3: Time for him to add vocals to the Blue album,

889
00:47:23,239 --> 00:47:25,040
Speaker 3: but there was no time for him to learn the

890
00:47:25,120 --> 00:47:28,080
Speaker 3: guitar parts and re record them, so Rivers took it

891
00:47:28,200 --> 00:47:32,160
Speaker 3: upon himself to do that. Rerick Okaesik told Rolling Stone

892
00:47:32,200 --> 00:47:36,560
Speaker 3: in twenty fourteen, after it was completely recorded, Rivers came

893
00:47:36,600 --> 00:47:39,080
Speaker 3: in and said, I'm firing the guitar player and I'm

894
00:47:39,080 --> 00:47:40,560
Speaker 3: going to do all his guitar parts over.

895
00:47:41,160 --> 00:47:46,000
Speaker 1: I said, you can't do that, but he did in

896
00:47:46,280 --> 00:47:47,160
Speaker 1: one take.

897
00:47:50,719 --> 00:47:55,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, dumb talented guitarist man. And you hear it. I mean,

898
00:47:55,120 --> 00:47:56,759
Speaker 2: I don't think we've really gotten to that. We will

899
00:47:56,760 --> 00:47:58,000
Speaker 2: when we get to the songs, but.

900
00:47:59,040 --> 00:47:59,480
Speaker 1: You hear it.

901
00:48:00,920 --> 00:48:04,680
Speaker 2: He admirably tamped a lot of his chops down, but

902
00:48:04,800 --> 00:48:06,080
Speaker 2: he's still in corks a few.

903
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:07,840
Speaker 1: That's nuts.

904
00:48:08,880 --> 00:48:11,160
Speaker 2: Uh yeah, Okay, good segue. Now we're going to talk

905
00:48:11,160 --> 00:48:11,760
Speaker 2: about the songs.

906
00:48:11,960 --> 00:48:12,600
Speaker 1: Album opener.

907
00:48:12,680 --> 00:48:16,360
Speaker 2: My name is Jonas was described by Cuomo to his

908
00:48:16,880 --> 00:48:22,080
Speaker 2: biographer Leursen as explaining how quote the plan is reaming

909
00:48:22,280 --> 00:48:27,439
Speaker 2: us all well said, especially my brother, Cuoma's younger brother

910
00:48:27,800 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 2: birth name.

911
00:48:28,680 --> 00:48:39,759
Speaker 1: Leaves pause for applause. Birth name leaves this thing on.

912
00:48:40,520 --> 00:48:43,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, was seriously injured in a September nineteen ninety two

913
00:48:43,120 --> 00:48:45,880
Speaker 2: car accident while attending Oberlin because of course he was,

914
00:48:46,920 --> 00:48:49,480
Speaker 2: and he submitted a claim for recovery cost, but his

915
00:48:49,640 --> 00:48:52,400
Speaker 2: insurance refused to pay because the accident had occurred in

916
00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:57,760
Speaker 2: his friend's car. Leaves aka James filed a lawsuit against

917
00:48:57,760 --> 00:49:00,520
Speaker 2: his insurance provider and was presumably laughed out of court

918
00:49:00,600 --> 00:49:02,480
Speaker 2: when he showed no he lost.

919
00:49:03,000 --> 00:49:07,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, insurance sucks, dude. This is where the Cuomo genius comes.

920
00:49:06,880 --> 00:49:09,600
Speaker 2: In, though he matched this up with Lois Lowry's nineteen

921
00:49:09,640 --> 00:49:14,080
Speaker 2: ninety three dystopian ya novel The Giver, which centers around

922
00:49:14,120 --> 00:49:16,719
Speaker 2: a twelve year old named Jonas. Throughout the course of

923
00:49:16,800 --> 00:49:21,040
Speaker 2: the book, Jonas uses a sled, and in River's brain

924
00:49:21,440 --> 00:49:24,480
Speaker 2: he thought I had a childhood's sled, and the name

925
00:49:24,520 --> 00:49:29,520
Speaker 2: of my childhood sled was Weepill, weep heel. So when

926
00:49:29,600 --> 00:49:32,080
Speaker 2: he says the thing that I've never under at the

927
00:49:32,239 --> 00:49:34,279
Speaker 2: top of the second verse, when he's like, my name

928
00:49:34,440 --> 00:49:37,799
Speaker 2: is Wheetpill, that's the name of Rivers Cooma's childhood sled,

929
00:49:38,239 --> 00:49:41,200
Speaker 2: which he inserted ended the song because the song already

930
00:49:41,320 --> 00:49:43,120
Speaker 2: had a reference to the giver.

931
00:49:44,120 --> 00:49:48,240
Speaker 1: Are we clear? Is there a Rosebud Citizen Kine connection

932
00:49:48,400 --> 00:49:49,080
Speaker 1: here too with this?

933
00:49:49,480 --> 00:49:51,040
Speaker 2: I didn't get into that. No, I don't think so.

934
00:49:52,360 --> 00:49:55,360
Speaker 2: The nimble, fingerpicked intro Jason Cropper worked out for the

935
00:49:55,400 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 2: song earned him his Soul Weezer compositional credit, which I

936
00:49:58,600 --> 00:49:59,280
Speaker 2: think is interesting.

937
00:50:00,160 --> 00:50:01,520
Speaker 1: Ah, we touched on this earlier.

938
00:50:01,600 --> 00:50:05,640
Speaker 2: But the other than he's like jarring enthusiasm for the

939
00:50:05,719 --> 00:50:10,359
Speaker 2: project and also just performing. I mean, it's hilarious seeing

940
00:50:10,360 --> 00:50:14,120
Speaker 2: clips around this time because it's like motion literally motionless,

941
00:50:14,239 --> 00:50:17,760
Speaker 2: Rivers Cuomo singing and Matt Sharp just like leaping around

942
00:50:17,840 --> 00:50:20,680
Speaker 2: in the background doing Pete Townsend windmills on his bass

943
00:50:21,040 --> 00:50:25,560
Speaker 2: while singing falsetto vocals. But those falsetto vocals make him

944
00:50:25,640 --> 00:50:28,239
Speaker 2: I think the secret MVP of this record. He had

945
00:50:28,320 --> 00:50:31,160
Speaker 2: never really sung lead before joining the band, and then

946
00:50:31,200 --> 00:50:33,399
Speaker 2: they decided they were gonna do this Beach Boys thing,

947
00:50:33,600 --> 00:50:37,640
Speaker 2: and rather than it's such a genius idiot move, rather

948
00:50:37,680 --> 00:50:40,600
Speaker 2: than learn actual harmonies, they were like, oh, just do

949
00:50:40,680 --> 00:50:43,920
Speaker 2: everything an octave up, like singing your falsetto, and so

950
00:50:44,040 --> 00:50:47,120
Speaker 2: they were just And it's really funny hearing it evolved

951
00:50:47,160 --> 00:50:49,520
Speaker 2: because like on some of the early demos, he's kind

952
00:50:49,600 --> 00:50:52,399
Speaker 2: of it. They're they're almost it's like the band, there's

953
00:50:52,480 --> 00:50:55,719
Speaker 2: like a really loose like they're singing Unison but not really.

954
00:50:56,239 --> 00:50:58,000
Speaker 2: And then by the time they made it to Blue album,

955
00:50:58,040 --> 00:51:01,680
Speaker 2: he's just like locked in Simon and Garfunkle style to

956
00:51:02,239 --> 00:51:05,200
Speaker 2: rivers vocal melodies. I always think it's the funniest thing

957
00:51:05,239 --> 00:51:12,320
Speaker 2: in saying so when he's like, like, that's that is

958
00:51:12,400 --> 00:51:14,600
Speaker 2: such a hard series of pitches to hit in a

959
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:17,160
Speaker 2: falsetto register is would you almost say that it's like

960
00:51:17,239 --> 00:51:19,040
Speaker 2: the vocal equivalent of the power chords.

961
00:51:19,320 --> 00:51:22,160
Speaker 1: I guess it's just actives never mind, Ah, yeah, sort of.

962
00:51:22,400 --> 00:51:25,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean your traditional vocal blend is probably like

963
00:51:25,640 --> 00:51:29,440
Speaker 2: a fifth and a third. Yeah, Uh, in some kind

964
00:51:29,440 --> 00:51:33,720
Speaker 2: of inversion, he told the blog perfect sound forever. Somewhere

965
00:51:33,719 --> 00:51:35,120
Speaker 2: in there is the desire to want to be like

966
00:51:35,200 --> 00:51:38,120
Speaker 2: Smokey Robinson. Ah, a part of me that never ceases

967
00:51:38,200 --> 00:51:40,920
Speaker 2: to enjoy singing in a sort of Southern falsetto voice.

968
00:51:41,600 --> 00:51:44,200
Speaker 2: It reminds me of an old Southern woman. It's always

969
00:51:44,239 --> 00:51:46,640
Speaker 2: a joy. That was actually how my vocal teacher in

970
00:51:47,000 --> 00:51:48,759
Speaker 2: New York taught me. That told me to think of

971
00:51:48,840 --> 00:51:51,279
Speaker 2: a falsetter. He's like, you know, you just gotta think

972
00:51:51,360 --> 00:51:56,120
Speaker 2: like you're an old, sassy black lady. Really, yeah, here's

973
00:51:56,160 --> 00:51:56,640
Speaker 2: a weird guy.

974
00:51:57,560 --> 00:51:57,719
Speaker 1: Well.

975
00:51:57,760 --> 00:51:59,880
Speaker 3: The second song on the record, no One Else, is

976
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:03,440
Speaker 3: supposedly written about one of Cuomo's ex girlfriends, a woman

977
00:52:03,560 --> 00:52:07,840
Speaker 3: named Petra, and Uh. We touched on this at the

978
00:52:07,880 --> 00:52:11,960
Speaker 3: top of the episode. As you write, let's just say,

979
00:52:12,880 --> 00:52:15,600
Speaker 3: if it wasn't intended as a prescient indictment of in

980
00:52:15,719 --> 00:52:17,319
Speaker 3: cell culture, it's such.

981
00:52:17,480 --> 00:52:20,200
Speaker 1: It wasn't. I don't think so. It's pretty bad.

982
00:52:20,719 --> 00:52:23,480
Speaker 3: The songs chorus, I want a girl who will laugh

983
00:52:23,560 --> 00:52:26,160
Speaker 3: for no one else When I'm away, she puts her

984
00:52:26,200 --> 00:52:29,319
Speaker 3: makeup on the shelf when I'm away, she never leaves

985
00:52:29,400 --> 00:52:33,680
Speaker 3: the house is basically the calling card of creepy return

986
00:52:33,760 --> 00:52:36,520
Speaker 3: to tradition men's rights guys on Twitter these days?

987
00:52:37,040 --> 00:52:37,959
Speaker 1: Have you seen those guys?

988
00:52:38,120 --> 00:52:41,880
Speaker 2: Like I always, oh, so you okay, I think just

989
00:52:41,960 --> 00:52:44,239
Speaker 2: through like some of the lefties that I follow, they

990
00:52:44,360 --> 00:52:45,239
Speaker 2: dunk on these guys.

991
00:52:45,360 --> 00:52:47,200
Speaker 1: But they're all dudes who have like Roman.

992
00:52:47,040 --> 00:52:50,640
Speaker 2: Statues as their profile picture, and they are constantly like

993
00:52:50,800 --> 00:52:53,600
Speaker 2: advocating like, you know, we just need to return to

994
00:52:54,200 --> 00:52:57,320
Speaker 2: the tradition of like the nuclear family unit, and like

995
00:52:57,480 --> 00:53:00,800
Speaker 2: my wife will you know, raise chicken on a farm

996
00:53:00,920 --> 00:53:03,040
Speaker 2: and our kids will have one hundred percent green and

997
00:53:03,120 --> 00:53:06,680
Speaker 2: pure food. And then like trad wife culture. Content has

998
00:53:06,760 --> 00:53:09,880
Speaker 2: become a thing. So there's like Instagram influencers who are

999
00:53:09,960 --> 00:53:13,240
Speaker 2: like these beautiful women but like dressed like the Amish,

1000
00:53:13,960 --> 00:53:18,920
Speaker 2: or in like high end Jivanci, like handmaking cocoa crispies

1001
00:53:19,000 --> 00:53:21,200
Speaker 2: for their children, and they all talk like this where

1002
00:53:21,200 --> 00:53:23,680
Speaker 2: they're like, oh, you know, my wife shouldn't wear makeup

1003
00:53:23,719 --> 00:53:28,200
Speaker 2: in public, like that's just for me. You know, it's

1004
00:53:28,239 --> 00:53:31,359
Speaker 2: as a whole insane. I can't believe you haven't bumped

1005
00:53:31,400 --> 00:53:34,560
Speaker 2: into any of it. They're all called like Western man

1006
00:53:35,280 --> 00:53:40,400
Speaker 2: inspiration or like you know, musings of Aurelius and then

1007
00:53:40,440 --> 00:53:42,120
Speaker 2: it'll just be a guy being like, yeah, I want

1008
00:53:42,120 --> 00:53:44,719
Speaker 2: my wife to be like super hot, but not for

1009
00:53:44,800 --> 00:53:47,520
Speaker 2: anyone just like me. We're gonna have like six kids

1010
00:53:47,560 --> 00:53:50,240
Speaker 2: and we're gonna raise EMUs and live on a farm.

1011
00:53:50,360 --> 00:53:53,840
Speaker 1: And what's the Rome connection.

1012
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:58,279
Speaker 2: I think they just think that, like the Roman like

1013
00:53:58,520 --> 00:54:05,400
Speaker 2: intellectual and war culture contributions is like the ideal state

1014
00:54:05,480 --> 00:54:08,920
Speaker 2: of I guess Western civilization, and think it needs to

1015
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:13,960
Speaker 2: be like, yes, the return art with a V in

1016
00:54:14,080 --> 00:54:16,920
Speaker 2: place of the U. Return to tradition is like the

1017
00:54:17,840 --> 00:54:18,600
Speaker 2: calling card.

1018
00:54:18,920 --> 00:54:22,760
Speaker 1: Huh, yeah, I haven't come across that in that form.

1019
00:54:23,440 --> 00:54:24,400
Speaker 2: I'll send you some stuff.

1020
00:54:24,600 --> 00:54:31,120
Speaker 1: Yeah, please. Quollo would only get worse and weirder in.

1021
00:54:31,160 --> 00:54:34,560
Speaker 3: This vein on Pinkerton, the band's sophomore record, Would you

1022
00:54:34,680 --> 00:54:35,800
Speaker 3: like to elaborate more on that?

1023
00:54:36,880 --> 00:54:40,200
Speaker 2: Well, sure, you know. There's the line damn you half

1024
00:54:40,280 --> 00:54:42,560
Speaker 2: Japanese girls do it to me all the time. There's

1025
00:54:42,600 --> 00:54:45,520
Speaker 2: the song pink Triangle, which is entirely about a man

1026
00:54:45,600 --> 00:54:47,840
Speaker 2: being in love with a lesbian, which was admittedly a

1027
00:54:47,920 --> 00:54:51,239
Speaker 2: theme at the time Chasing Amy had come out in

1028
00:54:51,320 --> 00:54:54,840
Speaker 2: a hilarious Rivers twist. He later found out that the

1029
00:54:54,880 --> 00:54:57,320
Speaker 2: woman that he was writing the song about was not

1030
00:54:57,440 --> 00:55:01,960
Speaker 2: actually a lesbian and was simply an LGBTQ ally, But yeah,

1031
00:55:02,000 --> 00:55:04,000
Speaker 2: pincertain is the weird one. I mean, there's that letter

1032
00:55:04,040 --> 00:55:06,400
Speaker 2: across the sea where I think he the one across

1033
00:55:06,480 --> 00:55:12,440
Speaker 2: the sea where he's talking about Uh yeah, he got

1034
00:55:12,520 --> 00:55:15,400
Speaker 2: a letter from like a Japanese fan and like like

1035
00:55:15,680 --> 00:55:20,600
Speaker 2: started fixating on her. Tired of sex is all about

1036
00:55:20,680 --> 00:55:23,080
Speaker 2: like all the passionless sex he had on the Blue

1037
00:55:23,080 --> 00:55:28,640
Speaker 2: album tour. But it's all very like creepy orientalist stuff.

1038
00:55:29,040 --> 00:55:31,400
Speaker 2: It's just like, yeah, it's like a straight white. That

1039
00:55:31,640 --> 00:55:35,480
Speaker 2: guy had a thing for Japanese culture via I must

1040
00:55:35,560 --> 00:55:38,560
Speaker 2: always add puccini. Yeah, I mean, well, I don't even

1041
00:55:38,600 --> 00:55:40,960
Speaker 2: know how you're gonna edit this together to make continuity.

1042
00:55:41,080 --> 00:55:44,160
Speaker 2: But at some point Rivers became obsessed with musical theater

1043
00:55:44,320 --> 00:55:47,680
Speaker 2: and like cats and Andreloyd Weber stuff. I don't know

1044
00:55:47,680 --> 00:55:49,520
Speaker 2: if it was specifically Angeloyd Webber, but it was like

1045
00:55:49,640 --> 00:55:53,160
Speaker 2: he became obsessed with like big, grandiose things and he

1046
00:55:53,640 --> 00:55:55,840
Speaker 2: mandated that he he was like, I'm gonna practice piano

1047
00:55:55,960 --> 00:55:59,040
Speaker 2: three hours a day, so he brought a piano like

1048
00:55:59,080 --> 00:56:01,400
Speaker 2: a digital keyboard on one of their all I think

1049
00:56:01,440 --> 00:56:03,680
Speaker 2: all their tours up until Pinkerton and would just like

1050
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:07,560
Speaker 2: lock himself in a room playing piano. And so the

1051
00:56:07,640 --> 00:56:10,799
Speaker 2: follow up to Blue album as You As You Once,

1052
00:56:10,880 --> 00:56:13,640
Speaker 2: where it was destined to be a rock opera set

1053
00:56:13,680 --> 00:56:17,279
Speaker 2: in space called Songs from the Black Hole, And at

1054
00:56:17,360 --> 00:56:21,920
Speaker 2: some point he gave that up as a fixation and

1055
00:56:22,320 --> 00:56:27,680
Speaker 2: got onto Madam Butterfly by Puccini, And so Pinkerton is

1056
00:56:27,800 --> 00:56:32,280
Speaker 2: a character from Madam a Butterfly, and that whole opera

1057
00:56:32,400 --> 00:56:35,480
Speaker 2: is viewed as this sort of orientalist view of like

1058
00:56:35,800 --> 00:56:38,440
Speaker 2: how straight white men view the Japanese women as like

1059
00:56:38,560 --> 00:56:43,600
Speaker 2: fragile but still sensual. And so when you get like

1060
00:56:43,680 --> 00:56:48,360
Speaker 2: a metalhead, like a deeply insecure, nerdy metalhead glombing onto that,

1061
00:56:48,520 --> 00:56:50,680
Speaker 2: it's basically like proto web culture.

1062
00:56:51,280 --> 00:56:54,600
Speaker 1: You're familiar with the term web I'm not no, but

1063
00:56:54,680 --> 00:56:55,759
Speaker 1: I don't like the sound of this.

1064
00:56:56,920 --> 00:56:59,239
Speaker 2: It's a derogatory term for people like white guys who

1065
00:56:59,280 --> 00:57:02,080
Speaker 2: were super inm anime and manga. It's like, I think

1066
00:57:02,120 --> 00:57:04,719
Speaker 2: it comes from a Japanese word for like nerdy white

1067
00:57:04,760 --> 00:57:06,120
Speaker 2: guy who is into.

1068
00:57:07,960 --> 00:57:08,239
Speaker 1: Hang on.

1069
00:57:08,719 --> 00:57:11,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, mostly derogatory slang for a person who's obsessed with

1070
00:57:11,440 --> 00:57:14,359
Speaker 2: Japanese culture. I was not a Japanese word.

1071
00:57:14,400 --> 00:57:14,799
Speaker 1: I was wrong.

1072
00:57:16,160 --> 00:57:20,720
Speaker 2: But yeah, Rivers became a web and wrote weird stuff

1073
00:57:20,760 --> 00:57:24,960
Speaker 2: about women on Pinkerton and somehow was disappointed that that

1074
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:27,120
Speaker 2: was not a hit. Later on, he talks about his

1075
00:57:27,240 --> 00:57:30,960
Speaker 2: bitter disappointment in not being like his fixation on Kirk Cobaina.

1076
00:57:31,080 --> 00:57:35,120
Speaker 2: Nirvana is really fascinating because he's like, truly he seemed

1077
00:57:35,160 --> 00:57:37,439
Speaker 2: truly baffled when they came out and people were like wow,

1078
00:57:37,600 --> 00:57:39,760
Speaker 2: nerd rock, Like he thought that they were writing like

1079
00:57:40,360 --> 00:57:42,640
Speaker 2: that they were going to be received as the next Nirvana.

1080
00:57:43,920 --> 00:57:47,880
Speaker 2: It's like, yeah, dude, with the cassio keyboard song Dame

1081
00:57:48,040 --> 00:57:51,520
Speaker 2: Dropping Buddy Holly, It's like, that's what you thought was

1082
00:57:51,600 --> 00:57:54,080
Speaker 2: gonna go. So there's like a there's a disconnect somewhere

1083
00:57:54,160 --> 00:57:56,640
Speaker 2: between what he's putting out and what he thinks it is.

1084
00:57:56,760 --> 00:57:58,520
Speaker 2: That is endlessly fascinating to me.

1085
00:57:59,280 --> 00:58:01,960
Speaker 1: I mean, the grace of God go all of us.

1086
00:58:02,680 --> 00:58:06,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly right, Like it's it is funny because like

1087
00:58:06,160 --> 00:58:09,080
Speaker 2: so much of their stuff that's dated is just like, yeah,

1088
00:58:09,120 --> 00:58:12,320
Speaker 2: that could have been any weird guy's trajectory in the nineties,

1089
00:58:12,400 --> 00:58:14,560
Speaker 2: and is a lot of weird Guy's trajectory in the

1090
00:58:14,640 --> 00:58:18,480
Speaker 2: two thousands. It's just one of them. One weird guy

1091
00:58:18,520 --> 00:58:20,680
Speaker 2: who had all of these hang ups happened to become

1092
00:58:20,920 --> 00:58:23,360
Speaker 2: one of the last rock stars on the planet. Like,

1093
00:58:24,160 --> 00:58:27,120
Speaker 2: oh well, it's just funny to me that we spend

1094
00:58:27,160 --> 00:58:29,560
Speaker 2: all this time pouring over this and like, you know,

1095
00:58:29,840 --> 00:58:33,720
Speaker 2: soft canceling him or whatever, and like Anthony Keatis is

1096
00:58:33,760 --> 00:58:37,480
Speaker 2: still just running around out there, uninhibited, like the ultimate

1097
00:58:38,000 --> 00:58:41,760
Speaker 2: offensive male idiot of nineties rock, just having a blast.

1098
00:58:45,360 --> 00:58:50,320
Speaker 1: I bet that guy, I know you do, Bud, I'm sorry,

1099
00:58:50,600 --> 00:58:56,800
Speaker 1: I know where were we next up? We've got The

1100
00:58:56,920 --> 00:59:00,040
Speaker 1: World has Turned and Left Me here? Tell us about that.

1101
00:59:01,080 --> 00:59:03,320
Speaker 2: As another song that, like my Name is Jonas, contains

1102
00:59:03,360 --> 00:59:07,120
Speaker 2: some deft fingerpicking courtesy of Jason Cropper. Cromo told the

1103
00:59:07,240 --> 00:59:09,240
Speaker 2: La Times, I still sweat if I have to play

1104
00:59:09,280 --> 00:59:12,439
Speaker 2: those songs at an acoustic show, and then he gave

1105
00:59:12,680 --> 00:59:16,720
Speaker 2: a deeply weird quote about this song, specifically to Chart

1106
00:59:16,840 --> 00:59:20,840
Speaker 2: magazine in December of nineteen ninety four, aggregated on weezer Pedia.

1107
00:59:21,800 --> 00:59:23,880
Speaker 2: I'm tempted to think that our song the World Has

1108
00:59:23,960 --> 00:59:25,440
Speaker 2: Turned and Left Me here is about the day my

1109
00:59:25,520 --> 00:59:28,520
Speaker 2: girlfriend left me. I remember that sad day I picked

1110
00:59:28,600 --> 00:59:30,800
Speaker 2: up my guitar and spilled tears of grief over those

1111
00:59:30,840 --> 00:59:34,200
Speaker 2: four sad chords. But if I think very carefully, I

1112
00:59:34,240 --> 00:59:36,120
Speaker 2: also remember that a week later I met this new

1113
00:59:36,160 --> 00:59:39,480
Speaker 2: girl named Sonia who speaks Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, and

1114
00:59:39,560 --> 00:59:42,400
Speaker 2: forgot all about the first girl. But still, to this

1115
00:59:42,600 --> 00:59:45,720
Speaker 2: day that song makes me sad and it still rings true.

1116
00:59:46,320 --> 00:59:48,200
Speaker 2: So maybe it wasn't about what's her name after all?

1117
00:59:48,720 --> 00:59:51,080
Speaker 2: Maybe it's the sublimated tale of how my mom refused

1118
00:59:51,120 --> 00:59:53,640
Speaker 2: to suckle me one night in my infancy. Who am

1119
00:59:53,680 --> 00:59:57,200
Speaker 2: I to say anyway? Fifth Weezer Carl Cock has a

1120
00:59:57,240 --> 01:00:00,280
Speaker 2: funny story about Rivers recording the guitar solo to the song,

1121
01:00:00,280 --> 01:00:02,400
Speaker 2: which he wrote in a set of liner notes to

1122
01:00:02,440 --> 01:00:05,840
Speaker 2: a reissue four Blue album. Six hours into trying to

1123
01:00:05,960 --> 01:00:08,560
Speaker 2: Nail The World Has Turned Solo, Rivers was laying on

1124
01:00:08,640 --> 01:00:10,760
Speaker 2: his back in the tiny twelve inch space between the

1125
01:00:10,800 --> 01:00:13,280
Speaker 2: two soundproof doors between the live room and the control room,

1126
01:00:13,520 --> 01:00:16,080
Speaker 2: with his guitar perched up on his chest, his legs

1127
01:00:16,080 --> 01:00:19,000
Speaker 2: squished up the walls. About one hundred tries into it,

1128
01:00:19,200 --> 01:00:22,560
Speaker 2: he'd given up when Rick Okasick hummed a little melody

1129
01:00:22,680 --> 01:00:26,160
Speaker 2: over the talkback mic. How about something like da da

1130
01:00:26,280 --> 01:00:29,400
Speaker 2: da D D D, And in five minutes the guitars

1131
01:00:29,440 --> 01:00:33,240
Speaker 2: were finished Buddy Holly, moving on to Buddy the Greatest

1132
01:00:33,240 --> 01:00:36,040
Speaker 2: Songs the nineties. The lyrics to Buddy Holly were taken

1133
01:00:36,080 --> 01:00:38,400
Speaker 2: from a real life incident that occurred when some of Rivers,

1134
01:00:38,480 --> 01:00:42,520
Speaker 2: Buds and Weezer were mocking his friend Young He, a

1135
01:00:42,600 --> 01:00:47,280
Speaker 2: classmate at Santa Monica Community College, for her haircut. They

1136
01:00:47,320 --> 01:00:49,840
Speaker 2: were the homies disin my girl. He wrote in a

1137
01:00:49,920 --> 01:00:52,400
Speaker 2: set of liner notes. I rarely wrote lyrics about the

1138
01:00:52,440 --> 01:00:54,200
Speaker 2: tension between me and the guys and the band because

1139
01:00:54,200 --> 01:00:55,640
Speaker 2: I thought it would be awkward for all of us

1140
01:00:55,680 --> 01:00:58,320
Speaker 2: to perform those songs together. In this case, though it

1141
01:00:58,360 --> 01:01:01,880
Speaker 2: didn't seem like a big deal. Cuomo was simultaneously messing

1142
01:01:01,920 --> 01:01:04,520
Speaker 2: around on a friend's new coord keyboard and attempted to

1143
01:01:04,600 --> 01:01:07,520
Speaker 2: write a quote neo new wave song inspired by some

1144
01:01:07,600 --> 01:01:09,840
Speaker 2: of the presets on there. I love how it has

1145
01:01:09,920 --> 01:01:12,840
Speaker 2: the it's got the like Ennio morri County good Man,

1146
01:01:12,880 --> 01:01:14,200
Speaker 2: and the ugly interval in there.

1147
01:01:15,640 --> 01:01:19,080
Speaker 1: Oh yes that's fine, which is very carzy too.

1148
01:01:19,240 --> 01:01:23,000
Speaker 2: I feel like, oh yeah, yeah, since a super super

1149
01:01:23,320 --> 01:01:27,920
Speaker 2: carzy uh the chorus melody, he said, the chorus melody

1150
01:01:28,320 --> 01:01:29,920
Speaker 2: I came up with as I was walking through the

1151
01:01:30,000 --> 01:01:32,800
Speaker 2: lawns of a campus. The melody was in time to

1152
01:01:32,880 --> 01:01:35,920
Speaker 2: my steps. The lyrics I struggled with trying to find

1153
01:01:35,960 --> 01:01:38,840
Speaker 2: the right reference point. An early version read ooh, Wi

1154
01:01:38,960 --> 01:01:42,200
Speaker 2: you you look just like Ginger Rogers. Oh oh, I

1155
01:01:42,360 --> 01:01:44,960
Speaker 2: moved just like Fred Astaire. Again, this is a guy

1156
01:01:45,000 --> 01:01:47,200
Speaker 2: who thought he was about to become the new Kirk Cobain.

1157
01:01:51,200 --> 01:01:51,960
Speaker 2: Just so bizarre.

1158
01:01:53,680 --> 01:01:56,120
Speaker 3: Producer Ric Okasik was the one who went to bat

1159
01:01:56,200 --> 01:01:59,480
Speaker 3: hardest for Buddy Holly. He would tell Clomo's biographer, I

1160
01:01:59,600 --> 01:02:02,200
Speaker 3: remember at one point he was hesitant to do Buddy Holly,

1161
01:02:02,480 --> 01:02:04,600
Speaker 3: and I was like, Rivers, we can talk about it,

1162
01:02:04,920 --> 01:02:06,520
Speaker 3: do it anyway, and if you don't like it when

1163
01:02:06,560 --> 01:02:08,560
Speaker 3: it's done, we won't use it. But I think you

1164
01:02:08,560 --> 01:02:10,720
Speaker 3: should try it. He did write it, and it's a

1165
01:02:10,760 --> 01:02:14,040
Speaker 3: great song. He didn't leave it at that though, where

1166
01:02:14,040 --> 01:02:16,200
Speaker 3: he's to remember. Matt Sharp recalled on a two thousand

1167
01:02:16,200 --> 01:02:18,880
Speaker 3: and eight interview with Blender, We'd come into the studio

1168
01:02:18,920 --> 01:02:21,080
Speaker 3: in the morning and find these little pieces of paper

1169
01:02:21,160 --> 01:02:25,360
Speaker 3: with doodles on them. We want Buddy Holly, presumably left

1170
01:02:25,440 --> 01:02:26,320
Speaker 3: by Rick okasik.

1171
01:02:26,400 --> 01:02:29,040
Speaker 1: I love that. What a nerd. That's cude, sweet nerd.

1172
01:02:29,240 --> 01:02:32,160
Speaker 1: I enjoy that a lot. Yeah, don' worry talking about this.

1173
01:02:32,240 --> 01:02:34,760
Speaker 3: It was the Billy Joel episode about how he wanted

1174
01:02:34,800 --> 01:02:37,040
Speaker 3: to leave I mean that's holistic, all right. There of

1175
01:02:37,160 --> 01:02:40,000
Speaker 3: artists who wanted to leave their big song off of

1176
01:02:40,120 --> 01:02:42,880
Speaker 3: the album. I wanted to believe just the way you

1177
01:02:43,000 --> 01:02:46,160
Speaker 3: are off of the Stranger because he thought it sounded

1178
01:02:46,200 --> 01:02:49,920
Speaker 3: like bad cruise ship rock, which I mean, yeah, he's

1179
01:02:50,000 --> 01:02:51,880
Speaker 3: not wrong. And then when the Ronstadt stopped by the

1180
01:02:51,920 --> 01:02:54,400
Speaker 3: studio and was like, no, you should you should do.

1181
01:02:54,520 --> 01:02:57,160
Speaker 2: That another way, in which she is like the Forest

1182
01:02:57,200 --> 01:03:00,520
Speaker 2: Gump of twentieth century American music. Yep, I forget what

1183
01:03:00,680 --> 01:03:02,600
Speaker 2: episode was it the Eagles when we ran down how

1184
01:03:02,640 --> 01:03:06,360
Speaker 2: she's been like a collaborator of virtually every developed nation

1185
01:03:06,680 --> 01:03:08,000
Speaker 2: and some undeveloped ones.

1186
01:03:08,600 --> 01:03:11,400
Speaker 3: That nich was it was I Will Always Love You,

1187
01:03:11,560 --> 01:03:13,400
Speaker 3: because it was her version of I Will Always Love

1188
01:03:13,440 --> 01:03:16,480
Speaker 3: You and not Delly Partons that got the attention of

1189
01:03:16,600 --> 01:03:20,160
Speaker 3: Kevin Costner, who gave it to Whitney Houston. And then

1190
01:03:20,200 --> 01:03:22,560
Speaker 3: you went off on this incredible tangent about exactly what

1191
01:03:22,640 --> 01:03:25,880
Speaker 3: you just said. She's the lynchpin of twentieth century music.

1192
01:03:26,720 --> 01:03:28,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, at least since the seventies. I mean just all

1193
01:03:28,680 --> 01:03:30,960
Speaker 2: of her stuff in the Laurel Canyon and the Nextees too.

1194
01:03:31,200 --> 01:03:34,000
Speaker 2: Mike Nesmith, Oh, that's true, so sixties and seventies. But

1195
01:03:34,040 --> 01:03:35,920
Speaker 2: then like you go through your discography and it's like

1196
01:03:36,000 --> 01:03:38,600
Speaker 2: she's done an album in like every genre of quote

1197
01:03:38,680 --> 01:03:42,600
Speaker 2: unquote world music and blessed her and Sullivan bless her

1198
01:03:42,760 --> 01:03:45,120
Speaker 2: like with those actual musicians.

1199
01:03:45,240 --> 01:03:48,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know, yeah, of course.

1200
01:03:48,800 --> 01:03:52,080
Speaker 3: Buddy Holly is followed up by perhaps Wheezer's defining statement

1201
01:03:52,680 --> 01:03:54,360
Speaker 3: undone parentheses.

1202
01:03:54,680 --> 01:03:55,560
Speaker 1: The Sweater song.

1203
01:03:56,640 --> 01:03:59,320
Speaker 3: As mentioned earlier, it was Cuemo's attempt at writing a

1204
01:03:59,480 --> 01:04:03,200
Speaker 3: velvet onunderground type song, only to be steamrolled by his

1205
01:04:03,320 --> 01:04:04,840
Speaker 3: innate love of Metallica.

1206
01:04:06,080 --> 01:04:07,160
Speaker 1: For a feature on the ten.

1207
01:04:07,120 --> 01:04:10,120
Speaker 3: Best Weezer Songs in Rolling Stone, Rivers explained it this way.

1208
01:04:10,640 --> 01:04:13,480
Speaker 3: I took typing psych one on one and English one

1209
01:04:13,520 --> 01:04:16,240
Speaker 3: on one that semester. It was in my English class

1210
01:04:16,280 --> 01:04:19,880
Speaker 3: that I heard the analogy of the unraveling sweater. Doctor

1211
01:04:19,960 --> 01:04:23,160
Speaker 3: Eisenstein used the image to demonstrate the effectiveness of a

1212
01:04:23,240 --> 01:04:26,440
Speaker 3: focused thesis statement in an essay, All I have to

1213
01:04:26,520 --> 01:04:28,880
Speaker 3: do is hold a single thread in your sweater and

1214
01:04:29,000 --> 01:04:30,720
Speaker 3: it will unravel as you walk away.

1215
01:04:32,120 --> 01:04:36,520
Speaker 1: See other guy royalties or something. Hey, I guess. For

1216
01:04:36,640 --> 01:04:39,360
Speaker 1: the album's press kit, Rivers was more subtle.

1217
01:04:40,080 --> 01:04:42,680
Speaker 3: Undone is the feeling you get when the train stops

1218
01:04:43,000 --> 01:04:45,600
Speaker 3: and the little guy comes knocking on your door. It

1219
01:04:45,720 --> 01:04:48,280
Speaker 3: was supposed to be a sad song, but everyone thinks

1220
01:04:48,280 --> 01:04:51,600
Speaker 3: it's hilarious. I don't get that analogy at all.

1221
01:04:52,280 --> 01:04:55,360
Speaker 1: He's a weird guy. Okay man, Yeah, okay man.

1222
01:04:55,920 --> 01:04:58,520
Speaker 3: The original version of Undone, though, threatened to tank the

1223
01:04:58,800 --> 01:05:02,680
Speaker 3: entire record. This is because Rivers had envisioned the song

1224
01:05:02,880 --> 01:05:07,560
Speaker 3: having a stereopanned conversation between two people run throughout the

1225
01:05:07,880 --> 01:05:12,000
Speaker 3: entire song, with one side representing the positive and the

1226
01:05:12,160 --> 01:05:15,000
Speaker 3: other side representing the negative, so one coming out of

1227
01:05:15,040 --> 01:05:17,600
Speaker 3: one side of the speaker channel, the other coming out

1228
01:05:17,600 --> 01:05:18,280
Speaker 3: of the other side.

1229
01:05:19,320 --> 01:05:20,320
Speaker 1: As Karl Koch.

1230
01:05:20,160 --> 01:05:22,720
Speaker 3: Explained in the liner notes of the Blue album reissue,

1231
01:05:23,160 --> 01:05:25,240
Speaker 3: this idea had been sort of lost when the band

1232
01:05:25,320 --> 01:05:28,520
Speaker 3: recorded their demos back in nineteen ninety two, and I'd

1233
01:05:28,560 --> 01:05:30,640
Speaker 3: been asked to come up with an audio collage of

1234
01:05:30,720 --> 01:05:34,240
Speaker 3: samples for the first two verses instead. It turned out

1235
01:05:34,280 --> 01:05:37,000
Speaker 3: pretty silly, but for the album, Rivers wanted to try

1236
01:05:37,080 --> 01:05:40,280
Speaker 3: and merge the two ideas a collage of samples that

1237
01:05:40,360 --> 01:05:42,520
Speaker 3: collectively had that positive.

1238
01:05:42,120 --> 01:05:43,400
Speaker 1: Negative argument going on.

1239
01:05:44,360 --> 01:05:49,720
Speaker 3: I obliged, gathering two hundred potential samples of everything from

1240
01:05:49,800 --> 01:05:53,560
Speaker 3: Humphrey Bogart to Christian radio dramas, the Peanuts Gang and

1241
01:05:53,720 --> 01:05:57,040
Speaker 3: story dialogue from the Black Hole, pairing it down to

1242
01:05:57,200 --> 01:06:00,520
Speaker 3: two fifteen sample sequences that I played out on a

1243
01:06:00,600 --> 01:06:05,160
Speaker 3: mini keyboard, creating the stereo conversation. In the end, it

1244
01:06:05,280 --> 01:06:07,640
Speaker 3: was this conversation that Geffen didn't want to deal with

1245
01:06:07,960 --> 01:06:11,480
Speaker 3: over fifteen different sample clearances for a debut rock album.

1246
01:06:11,760 --> 01:06:16,560
Speaker 1: Not gonna happen. What a terrible idea, deeply awful.

1247
01:06:18,600 --> 01:06:21,280
Speaker 2: What did happen, though, was the now famous conversation between

1248
01:06:21,880 --> 01:06:25,640
Speaker 2: two very different personality types at a simulated party. This

1249
01:06:25,800 --> 01:06:27,840
Speaker 2: being the early nineties, it was a pain in the ass.

1250
01:06:28,520 --> 01:06:33,400
Speaker 2: As fifth Wheez Carl Kotch explained. This was done on

1251
01:06:33,520 --> 01:06:36,000
Speaker 2: Rivers eight track back in the Garage on Amherstave in

1252
01:06:36,160 --> 01:06:42,280
Speaker 2: LA with Michael Allen, band supporter, bassist Matt Sharp, myself, Carl,

1253
01:06:42,560 --> 01:06:47,120
Speaker 2: and a crowd noise sound effect CD A mix of

1254
01:06:47,240 --> 01:06:49,760
Speaker 2: undone with the samples removed was made to a DAT

1255
01:06:49,920 --> 01:06:53,120
Speaker 2: digital audio tape at Electric Lady, which was then sent

1256
01:06:53,400 --> 01:06:57,040
Speaker 2: to LA where Rivers copied it onto two stereotracs of

1257
01:06:57,080 --> 01:07:00,600
Speaker 2: his eight track cassette recorder. Onto the un U tracks

1258
01:07:00,600 --> 01:07:02,720
Speaker 2: of the cassette recorder went the party noise from the

1259
01:07:02,800 --> 01:07:06,640
Speaker 2: CD and the conversation, and then that was mixed down

1260
01:07:06,720 --> 01:07:09,240
Speaker 2: to another DAT tape, which was then sent back to

1261
01:07:09,360 --> 01:07:12,600
Speaker 2: New York. The finished party dialogue scenes were then flown

1262
01:07:12,680 --> 01:07:16,760
Speaker 2: into the final mix just in time to get mastered. Insane.

1263
01:07:17,560 --> 01:07:19,880
Speaker 1: A lot of work for a not that great idea.

1264
01:07:21,240 --> 01:07:24,280
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just so funny that it's like the

1265
01:07:25,080 --> 01:07:29,120
Speaker 2: workflow to just get the sound of people like acting

1266
01:07:29,240 --> 01:07:32,880
Speaker 2: like nineties stoner cliches at a party. You know, surely

1267
01:07:32,960 --> 01:07:35,760
Speaker 2: that could have been accomplished at Electric Lady Studios.

1268
01:07:35,880 --> 01:07:36,080
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1269
01:07:38,640 --> 01:07:40,440
Speaker 3: One of the voices you hear on that song, the

1270
01:07:40,480 --> 01:07:44,200
Speaker 3: aforementioned Michael Allen was one half of the Weezer super

1271
01:07:44,280 --> 01:07:48,280
Speaker 3: Friends and Fan Club co founders. Her sister Carle was

1272
01:07:48,320 --> 01:07:50,680
Speaker 3: the other, and the two were fans of the band

1273
01:07:50,720 --> 01:07:53,520
Speaker 3: since their first days as a group. They'd seen the

1274
01:07:53,600 --> 01:07:56,720
Speaker 3: band at Club Dump, which was later transformed into the

1275
01:07:56,800 --> 01:08:00,520
Speaker 3: infamous Viper Room in Los Angeles in July nineteen ninety two,

1276
01:08:01,080 --> 01:08:03,240
Speaker 3: and they were some of the biggest boosters of Weezer.

1277
01:08:03,880 --> 01:08:07,280
Speaker 3: As fan club founders, they spent hours organizing mailing lists

1278
01:08:07,320 --> 01:08:10,320
Speaker 3: and stuffing envelopes with their own membership cards.

1279
01:08:10,080 --> 01:08:14,040
Speaker 1: Reading zero zero zero one and zero zero.

1280
01:08:14,040 --> 01:08:19,479
Speaker 3: Zero two, forever earning them. The title was Weezer's Top Fans. Sadly,

1281
01:08:20,280 --> 01:08:23,360
Speaker 3: as Koch recalled the Magnet magazine, the last show of

1282
01:08:23,400 --> 01:08:26,200
Speaker 3: the Pinkaton tour, the last show before going dark for

1283
01:08:26,280 --> 01:08:29,519
Speaker 3: three years, was a memorial concert for Michael and Carly,

1284
01:08:29,720 --> 01:08:32,120
Speaker 3: the two sisters that ran our fan club, who were

1285
01:08:32,200 --> 01:08:34,960
Speaker 3: killed in a car accident. They were traveling with us

1286
01:08:35,200 --> 01:08:38,880
Speaker 3: organizing fan club meetups at shows, driving from Denver to

1287
01:08:38,960 --> 01:08:42,720
Speaker 3: Salt Lake. Whoever was driving fell asleep. We decided to

1288
01:08:42,800 --> 01:08:44,880
Speaker 3: schedule a memorial show at the end of the tour

1289
01:08:44,960 --> 01:08:48,120
Speaker 3: in Los Angeles to help the family out. Three of

1290
01:08:48,200 --> 01:08:51,800
Speaker 3: their daughters passed away, Michael, Carly, and the sister who

1291
01:08:51,920 --> 01:08:53,080
Speaker 3: was in the vehicle at the time.

1292
01:08:53,840 --> 01:08:57,320
Speaker 1: It was brutal. The next Weezer album, released in two

1293
01:08:57,320 --> 01:09:00,280
Speaker 1: thousand and one, would be dedicated to them. The album

1294
01:09:00,320 --> 01:09:02,200
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that that's awful.

1295
01:09:03,120 --> 01:09:07,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, really really sad because I think they Weezer didn't

1296
01:09:07,280 --> 01:09:09,559
Speaker 2: write this song as a tribute after they died. They

1297
01:09:09,640 --> 01:09:11,800
Speaker 2: wrote it like in their early days. And one of

1298
01:09:11,840 --> 01:09:15,640
Speaker 2: them in an interview had talked about like Rivers like

1299
01:09:15,760 --> 01:09:18,360
Speaker 2: calling them up and being like because they were just butts,

1300
01:09:18,520 --> 01:09:20,880
Speaker 2: they were just friends of the band, and so Rivers

1301
01:09:20,920 --> 01:09:22,479
Speaker 2: would call them up and be like, Yo, what street

1302
01:09:22,479 --> 01:09:25,080
Speaker 2: did you grow up on? Like what was your childhood like?

1303
01:09:25,479 --> 01:09:27,920
Speaker 2: And all that went into this this song. And then

1304
01:09:27,920 --> 01:09:29,760
Speaker 2: the first time they played it for them, they like

1305
01:09:30,000 --> 01:09:33,840
Speaker 2: wept openly in the crowd. May all bands have at

1306
01:09:33,920 --> 01:09:39,880
Speaker 2: least one fan like that, you are ours? You were ours?

1307
01:09:41,080 --> 01:09:41,240
Speaker 3: Uh?

1308
01:09:41,560 --> 01:09:44,439
Speaker 2: Surfwaxs America great song, another one with an intro riff

1309
01:09:44,520 --> 01:09:47,040
Speaker 2: that Cuomo has acknowledged came from Jason Cropper, although he

1310
01:09:47,080 --> 01:09:49,360
Speaker 2: did not get a compositional credit on it, and did

1311
01:09:49,400 --> 01:09:52,200
Speaker 2: an interview with bill Board in twenty nineteen. Pat Wilson,

1312
01:09:52,400 --> 01:09:56,719
Speaker 2: the drummer for Weezer founding member, not the actor, called

1313
01:09:57,560 --> 01:10:01,559
Speaker 2: he called surf Wags America another desk needed up tempo number.

1314
01:10:02,240 --> 01:10:04,400
Speaker 2: Rivers especially really loved the Beach Boys, and I think

1315
01:10:04,400 --> 01:10:06,040
Speaker 2: he tapped into that vibe a little, but in a

1316
01:10:06,080 --> 01:10:08,360
Speaker 2: more punk rock way. I don't believe any of us

1317
01:10:08,439 --> 01:10:11,400
Speaker 2: had ever surfed. At that point, we were painfully lacking

1318
01:10:11,479 --> 01:10:16,840
Speaker 2: in self awareness. Ah, the Weezer mission statement, it's a

1319
01:10:16,920 --> 01:10:19,240
Speaker 2: young person's take on the world saying this is all

1320
01:10:19,320 --> 01:10:21,320
Speaker 2: bull I'm just gonna do whatever I want to do.

1321
01:10:22,160 --> 01:10:24,560
Speaker 2: I think it's a rejection of paths chosen for you.

1322
01:10:25,360 --> 01:10:27,960
Speaker 2: Other fun facts about the song from Weezer Pedia. The

1323
01:10:28,040 --> 01:10:30,400
Speaker 2: song's first verse contains a reference to the song Round

1324
01:10:30,439 --> 01:10:35,800
Speaker 2: and Round by American Hair Metal also RAN's rat with

1325
01:10:35,960 --> 01:10:38,880
Speaker 2: two te's, and it's become a niche fan ritual to

1326
01:10:39,000 --> 01:10:43,519
Speaker 2: yell smoke dope at live performances of the song when

1327
01:10:43,600 --> 01:10:46,160
Speaker 2: it goes into the breakdown section in the middle, solely

1328
01:10:46,280 --> 01:10:52,200
Speaker 2: because there is an oft circulated live recording of Surf

1329
01:10:52,280 --> 01:10:54,879
Speaker 2: Wax America in which a guy in the crowd yells

1330
01:10:55,439 --> 01:10:58,480
Speaker 2: smoke dope. So that is a lesson in the intensity

1331
01:10:58,520 --> 01:11:03,639
Speaker 2: of Weezer fandom. They have started recreating at shows currently

1332
01:11:03,720 --> 01:11:08,719
Speaker 2: happening live bits from what were initially like bootleg only

1333
01:11:08,840 --> 01:11:09,600
Speaker 2: live recordings.

1334
01:11:10,960 --> 01:11:12,519
Speaker 1: I appreciate that. I applaud that.

1335
01:11:13,160 --> 01:11:20,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, I bet you too, he said rudely. Up next,

1336
01:11:20,360 --> 01:11:23,800
Speaker 2: we have again another defining statement say it Ain't So.

1337
01:11:25,280 --> 01:11:27,120
Speaker 2: I found it really interesting going back and listening to

1338
01:11:27,200 --> 01:11:29,640
Speaker 2: some of the demos of this song, where you can

1339
01:11:29,720 --> 01:11:33,120
Speaker 2: absolutely hear Rivers Cuomo doing John Frisciani and like all

1340
01:11:33,200 --> 01:11:36,479
Speaker 2: the stuff that John Frusciani lifted from Hendrix to do

1341
01:11:36,720 --> 01:11:39,120
Speaker 2: in the red on chili peppers, and then they paired

1342
01:11:39,160 --> 01:11:41,519
Speaker 2: it all down for the recording, which is good choice.

1343
01:11:42,400 --> 01:11:44,760
Speaker 2: This song's imagery comes from his teen years when he

1344
01:11:44,800 --> 01:11:48,439
Speaker 2: saw a beer in the family refrigerator, which prompted him

1345
01:11:48,479 --> 01:11:51,479
Speaker 2: to panic that his stepfather was planning to leave the family.

1346
01:11:51,880 --> 01:11:58,280
Speaker 2: Also because Rivers had mistakenly connected his birth father's abandonment

1347
01:11:58,400 --> 01:12:02,680
Speaker 2: of the family with alcohol. Jordan, please delve into this

1348
01:12:02,840 --> 01:12:04,880
Speaker 2: fascinating dynamic that spawned a hit song.

1349
01:12:05,240 --> 01:12:08,920
Speaker 3: Yes, Rivers explained to the La Times, my birth father

1350
01:12:09,120 --> 01:12:11,559
Speaker 3: only had a fax machine at the time, and out

1351
01:12:11,600 --> 01:12:14,000
Speaker 3: of the blue, I got this fax from him, Weezer,

1352
01:12:14,240 --> 01:12:15,000
Speaker 3: give me a call.

1353
01:12:15,240 --> 01:12:17,800
Speaker 1: We need to talk. So I got in touch and

1354
01:12:17,920 --> 01:12:19,880
Speaker 1: explained where I was coming from in the song.

1355
01:12:20,520 --> 01:12:22,559
Speaker 3: But I'm kind of morrified that a lot of say

1356
01:12:22,600 --> 01:12:24,920
Speaker 3: it ain't So, as powerful as it is and as

1357
01:12:24,960 --> 01:12:28,200
Speaker 3: true as it is, is based on a misunderstanding the

1358
01:12:28,360 --> 01:12:30,400
Speaker 3: root of it is this photograph I have of my

1359
01:12:30,600 --> 01:12:33,840
Speaker 3: dad and my mom where he's wearing a sleeveless undershirt

1360
01:12:34,240 --> 01:12:36,599
Speaker 3: and smoking a cigar and holding a Heineken.

1361
01:12:37,200 --> 01:12:38,480
Speaker 1: He looks so intimidating.

1362
01:12:39,240 --> 01:12:41,280
Speaker 3: Years later, I was talking to my mom about it,

1363
01:12:41,360 --> 01:12:43,480
Speaker 3: and she said he wasn't an alcoholic.

1364
01:12:44,000 --> 01:12:46,160
Speaker 1: He didn't even drink or smoke. He was like a

1365
01:12:46,280 --> 01:12:49,320
Speaker 1: zen Buddhist guy. We were just goofing around in that picture.

1366
01:12:49,800 --> 01:12:50,879
Speaker 1: Those were just props.

1367
01:12:52,800 --> 01:13:00,240
Speaker 2: Wow, Yeah, just like misinterpreting your entire familiar dynamic for

1368
01:13:00,400 --> 01:13:03,400
Speaker 2: decades based on a snapshot, yeah, and then making a

1369
01:13:03,520 --> 01:13:07,200
Speaker 2: hit song out of it and having your dad like,

1370
01:13:07,400 --> 01:13:09,960
Speaker 2: get back in touch with you because yeah, yeah, one

1371
01:13:10,040 --> 01:13:12,479
Speaker 2: of the three times you spoke with him were like

1372
01:13:12,560 --> 01:13:14,479
Speaker 2: four times you'd ever spoken with him, to be like,

1373
01:13:15,000 --> 01:13:17,200
Speaker 2: thank you for doing that. It was incorrect.

1374
01:13:20,240 --> 01:13:22,720
Speaker 3: The line you cleaned up found Jesus, though he is

1375
01:13:22,800 --> 01:13:25,759
Speaker 3: addressed to his birth father, who, as you mentioned earlier,

1376
01:13:25,840 --> 01:13:30,280
Speaker 3: became a pentecostal preacher. In a twenty fourteen Rolling Stone interview,

1377
01:13:30,439 --> 01:13:33,840
Speaker 3: Rivers talks about watching his father preach sermons and how

1378
01:13:33,920 --> 01:13:36,519
Speaker 3: it made him feel better about being an introvert fronting

1379
01:13:36,600 --> 01:13:40,000
Speaker 3: a rock band, seeing himself in his dad's movement and speech,

1380
01:13:40,800 --> 01:13:42,880
Speaker 3: which is sweet in its own way.

1381
01:13:42,960 --> 01:13:45,680
Speaker 1: Did they ever yeah, like reconcile in any meaningful way?

1382
01:13:45,800 --> 01:13:47,280
Speaker 1: He said that he's yeah, he yeah.

1383
01:13:47,280 --> 01:13:49,280
Speaker 2: I think his quote in like twenty fourteen was like,

1384
01:13:49,439 --> 01:13:51,800
Speaker 2: now that I'm a father, I've forgiven my dad, which

1385
01:13:52,439 --> 01:13:55,760
Speaker 2: story of everybody's like again again, just such a fascinating

1386
01:13:55,840 --> 01:13:58,920
Speaker 2: guy man, Like you know, he's talked so much about

1387
01:13:58,960 --> 01:14:03,640
Speaker 2: how like like he metates every day, which is not

1388
01:14:03,680 --> 01:14:05,080
Speaker 2: a weird thing, a lot of people do that, but

1389
01:14:05,280 --> 01:14:08,240
Speaker 2: just this whole he's described a lot of his like

1390
01:14:08,720 --> 01:14:11,240
Speaker 2: way of being as like being steeped in these Eastern

1391
01:14:11,280 --> 01:14:14,360
Speaker 2: philosophies growing up like meditation and zen thinking and everything,

1392
01:14:14,720 --> 01:14:17,080
Speaker 2: and also being very much like a product of like

1393
01:14:17,360 --> 01:14:20,719
Speaker 2: straight man rock, like growing up in the seventies and eighties.

1394
01:14:21,160 --> 01:14:24,680
Speaker 2: And this detail, well, the Jimmy in the song is

1395
01:14:24,720 --> 01:14:27,600
Speaker 2: also his brother Leaves by the way, And here is

1396
01:14:27,720 --> 01:14:30,800
Speaker 2: my the most crushing detail about say it ain't so

1397
01:14:30,960 --> 01:14:34,240
Speaker 2: that you will never ever be able to forget unless

1398
01:14:34,400 --> 01:14:36,439
Speaker 2: you are already a Weezer fan and have internalized it.

1399
01:14:37,160 --> 01:14:40,640
Speaker 2: The single, back when they were CD singles for this

1400
01:14:40,840 --> 01:14:44,759
Speaker 2: song was released with artwork that was a childhood drawing

1401
01:14:45,040 --> 01:14:48,080
Speaker 2: Rivers made of he and his birth father playing soccer.

1402
01:14:48,640 --> 01:14:51,040
Speaker 2: You may remember that his dad supposedly named him after

1403
01:14:51,080 --> 01:14:54,120
Speaker 2: a bunch of World Cup soccer players, and the art

1404
01:14:54,200 --> 01:14:57,680
Speaker 2: focuses on a young Rivers scoring a goal, which is

1405
01:14:58,040 --> 01:15:01,240
Speaker 2: given the childlike phonetic spelling of g olll and his

1406
01:15:01,439 --> 01:15:05,599
Speaker 2: father cheering him on with lines like yay, my son, Wow,

1407
01:15:05,760 --> 01:15:07,240
Speaker 2: cat's in the cradle slowly faded.

1408
01:15:07,120 --> 01:15:11,400
Speaker 1: Oh my yes, yes, yes, yes, I know.

1409
01:15:11,680 --> 01:15:13,880
Speaker 2: So speaking of that single release, the version of Sad

1410
01:15:13,920 --> 01:15:16,200
Speaker 2: and So that went out on the on the original

1411
01:15:16,280 --> 01:15:19,600
Speaker 2: version of Blue album didn't have that awesome feedback that

1412
01:15:19,720 --> 01:15:22,320
Speaker 2: comes in right before the right before the chorus kicks it.

1413
01:15:22,360 --> 01:15:25,040
Speaker 2: I'm getting goosebumps talking about it's such an awesome part

1414
01:15:25,120 --> 01:15:27,200
Speaker 2: of that song. And then when man heard it with

1415
01:15:27,320 --> 01:15:29,519
Speaker 2: the feedback in, they were like, no, that should have

1416
01:15:29,600 --> 01:15:31,719
Speaker 2: been there all along. And so that's the new master

1417
01:15:33,080 --> 01:15:34,880
Speaker 2: in the video for the song, it was the third

1418
01:15:34,920 --> 01:15:37,360
Speaker 2: one that they'd done for the record, the one that

1419
01:15:37,439 --> 01:15:39,560
Speaker 2: they didn't do with Spike Jones. They did it with

1420
01:15:39,640 --> 01:15:43,640
Speaker 2: Sofie Sophie Mueller, and it's in there old It's a

1421
01:15:43,720 --> 01:15:46,240
Speaker 2: glimpse that you can see of their their place in

1422
01:15:46,479 --> 01:15:50,080
Speaker 2: l A H. And there are indeed heavy metal posters.

1423
01:15:50,160 --> 01:15:52,880
Speaker 2: On the background. You can see King Diamond, who is

1424
01:15:53,520 --> 01:15:57,519
Speaker 2: the vocal the first the lead singer of Mercall Fate

1425
01:15:57,640 --> 01:16:02,080
Speaker 2: and then his own band. So that's fun in the garage,

1426
01:16:02,160 --> 01:16:04,280
Speaker 2: moving on to in the garage and other. I god,

1427
01:16:04,400 --> 01:16:06,760
Speaker 2: this song is so pure to me. Yeah, it's like

1428
01:16:06,960 --> 01:16:10,519
Speaker 2: toy story or something. Man, it is such a like cute,

1429
01:16:12,240 --> 01:16:17,360
Speaker 2: like whimsical song about like the pains of growing up

1430
01:16:17,640 --> 01:16:22,479
Speaker 2: I feel, And it's just you know, it is yeah,

1431
01:16:22,560 --> 01:16:24,800
Speaker 2: like looking back on like the childhood passions that you

1432
01:16:24,960 --> 01:16:27,839
Speaker 2: had when you were like safe and secure before society

1433
01:16:27,880 --> 01:16:31,080
Speaker 2: started telling you you were weird for them. But again,

1434
01:16:31,160 --> 01:16:33,719
Speaker 2: like also in nineteen ninety five, coming out of grunge

1435
01:16:33,920 --> 01:16:37,960
Speaker 2: and like Lane Stalely bellowing about burnt corpses and rooster

1436
01:16:38,280 --> 01:16:41,760
Speaker 2: and you know Eddie Vedder singing about Jeremy. You have

1437
01:16:41,880 --> 01:16:45,799
Speaker 2: little real little rivers coming on and singing about X Men, comics,

1438
01:16:45,880 --> 01:16:48,960
Speaker 2: dungeons and dragons and kiss. I didn't know this until

1439
01:16:49,080 --> 01:16:51,559
Speaker 2: reading about this, but their dedication to dungeons and Dragons

1440
01:16:51,640 --> 01:16:54,439
Speaker 2: is impressive. They had a tour where their setlist was

1441
01:16:54,479 --> 01:16:59,439
Speaker 2: determined by rolling a twenty sided die, and as with

1442
01:16:59,520 --> 01:17:02,680
Speaker 2: everything we it masks the deep well of sadness that

1443
01:17:02,800 --> 01:17:07,040
Speaker 2: hides behind Crooma's sort of impassivity. This is in his

1444
01:17:07,520 --> 01:17:10,519
Speaker 2: bio sheet for the record label that came out with

1445
01:17:10,760 --> 01:17:12,760
Speaker 2: for the like the record label biosheet that came out

1446
01:17:12,800 --> 01:17:13,280
Speaker 2: with Blue album.

1447
01:17:13,320 --> 01:17:13,680
Speaker 1: He wrote this.

1448
01:17:13,760 --> 01:17:17,400
Speaker 2: Himself because I'm so terrible at expressing my feelings directly,

1449
01:17:17,640 --> 01:17:20,800
Speaker 2: and because no one really cares, and because anything real

1450
01:17:20,920 --> 01:17:23,599
Speaker 2: is almost impossible to talk about. I've come to rely

1451
01:17:23,760 --> 01:17:26,720
Speaker 2: on music more and more to express myself. And then

1452
01:17:26,760 --> 01:17:28,920
Speaker 2: you pair that with a quote from this twenty fourteen

1453
01:17:29,000 --> 01:17:31,880
Speaker 2: Rolling Stone profile where he says, I'm often troubled by

1454
01:17:31,920 --> 01:17:34,439
Speaker 2: a very strong instinct to share everything that's going on

1455
01:17:34,600 --> 01:17:37,080
Speaker 2: with me. I want to feel that connection, even with

1456
01:17:37,160 --> 01:17:39,680
Speaker 2: people I don't know. Then there's this other voice that

1457
01:17:39,800 --> 01:17:42,760
Speaker 2: says that's not prudent. People will use what you've said

1458
01:17:42,800 --> 01:17:45,479
Speaker 2: to hurt you. Again, I do not want to live

1459
01:17:45,479 --> 01:17:49,960
Speaker 2: in that guy's head. Holiday another great song. Just some

1460
01:17:50,080 --> 01:17:54,120
Speaker 2: more great songs, interesting lyrical concepts under the hood. In

1461
01:17:54,200 --> 01:17:56,880
Speaker 2: a fan interview in two thousand and six, Quoma said

1462
01:17:56,880 --> 01:18:00,479
Speaker 2: that he had a big Jack Caroac phase, which I again,

1463
01:18:00,600 --> 01:18:02,559
Speaker 2: there's like lyrics on this album that I'd never really

1464
01:18:02,920 --> 01:18:05,760
Speaker 2: parsed until I was researching this. He does, in fact

1465
01:18:05,800 --> 01:18:08,519
Speaker 2: say on the road with Krawak in the breakdown to

1466
01:18:08,560 --> 01:18:12,600
Speaker 2: the middle of that song, and you'll love this. The

1467
01:18:12,720 --> 01:18:16,120
Speaker 2: opening line Let's go away for a while is a

1468
01:18:16,240 --> 01:18:18,519
Speaker 2: direct title of a Beach Boys track on pet Sounds.

1469
01:18:19,160 --> 01:18:21,400
Speaker 2: And you are holding a copy of pet Sounds up

1470
01:18:21,439 --> 01:18:22,720
Speaker 2: to me. Do you just have one of those with

1471
01:18:22,840 --> 01:18:23,799
Speaker 2: you every time you record?

1472
01:18:24,760 --> 01:18:29,040
Speaker 3: It's like liness with his blanket. Yeah, it's like I'm

1473
01:18:29,120 --> 01:18:31,000
Speaker 3: recording now, Brian recorded this.

1474
01:18:31,880 --> 01:18:32,920
Speaker 1: I can do just as good.

1475
01:18:34,160 --> 01:18:37,160
Speaker 2: Well, here's another tremendously depressing quote from Rivers from nineteen

1476
01:18:37,200 --> 01:18:41,000
Speaker 2: ninety seven letter that he wrote the road of the

1477
01:18:41,120 --> 01:18:45,439
Speaker 2: song is any form of escapism, be it beautiful melodies, drinking, drugs,

1478
01:18:45,560 --> 01:18:48,760
Speaker 2: love art, whatever. However, it is important to note that

1479
01:18:49,080 --> 01:18:52,640
Speaker 2: even in the song holiday escape is short lived. Right

1480
01:18:52,720 --> 01:18:55,519
Speaker 2: after the line on this road will never die come

1481
01:18:55,600 --> 01:18:57,840
Speaker 2: the ominous crashing chords of fate.

1482
01:18:58,840 --> 01:19:05,240
Speaker 1: Okay, cool man, this brings us to only in dreams.

1483
01:19:06,120 --> 01:19:08,679
Speaker 3: Funnily enough, well, it's easier to assume that the song's

1484
01:19:08,800 --> 01:19:12,400
Speaker 3: lyrics are a straightforward relationship. Cuomo told Rolling Stone in

1485
01:19:12,439 --> 01:19:15,720
Speaker 3: twenty ten that the song is really about his artistic process,

1486
01:19:16,439 --> 01:19:19,280
Speaker 3: by which you think he means that attempting to get

1487
01:19:19,280 --> 01:19:21,519
Speaker 3: a song to live up to the expectations you hear

1488
01:19:22,240 --> 01:19:24,479
Speaker 3: or have in your head is a lot like building

1489
01:19:24,560 --> 01:19:27,280
Speaker 3: up a romantic partner to an unachievable ideal.

1490
01:19:28,439 --> 01:19:30,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I mean I think that makes sense he

1491
01:19:32,479 --> 01:19:35,240
Speaker 2: you know, as any kind of creative person, right, Like,

1492
01:19:35,320 --> 01:19:37,519
Speaker 2: you start with this idea in your head and you're like, oh.

1493
01:19:37,520 --> 01:19:39,920
Speaker 1: It's got to be this amazing dag and I'm gonna problem.

1494
01:19:39,640 --> 01:19:42,519
Speaker 2: And that the more you work with it, yeah, and

1495
01:19:42,800 --> 01:19:46,519
Speaker 2: live with it, like, the more you start to realize

1496
01:19:46,640 --> 01:19:49,800
Speaker 2: this will never sound, read look like the thing that

1497
01:19:49,880 --> 01:19:52,280
Speaker 2: I have in my head. And I think that is

1498
01:19:52,560 --> 01:19:56,719
Speaker 2: a very similar situation that a lot of mostly single

1499
01:19:56,840 --> 01:19:59,920
Speaker 2: young men find themselves in with women from a Fall.

1500
01:20:02,240 --> 01:20:05,920
Speaker 2: But there's another even more horrible influence lurking Yes.

1501
01:20:07,720 --> 01:20:12,800
Speaker 3: In the afore mentioned podcast Shred with Shifty Rivers said

1502
01:20:12,840 --> 01:20:15,960
Speaker 3: the long instrumental portion of the song was inspired by

1503
01:20:16,080 --> 01:20:20,920
Speaker 3: jam Icon's Fish and their guitarist Trey Anastasia, saying, I

1504
01:20:21,000 --> 01:20:23,519
Speaker 3: went to Fish shows and had the tapes and it

1505
01:20:23,640 --> 01:20:25,120
Speaker 3: was like, man.

1506
01:20:25,080 --> 01:20:28,600
Speaker 1: This is just so transcendent. The way Trey plays, and

1507
01:20:28,760 --> 01:20:30,160
Speaker 1: that's kind of what I wanted to do.

1508
01:20:32,120 --> 01:20:34,439
Speaker 3: The solo in the song has repeatedly come up as

1509
01:20:34,479 --> 01:20:37,800
Speaker 3: one of his favorites, though Weezerpedia has hopefully noted that

1510
01:20:37,880 --> 01:20:41,559
Speaker 3: in two thousand and two, Quomo's quote infamously derided only

1511
01:20:41,640 --> 01:20:47,599
Speaker 3: in Dreams on the Rivers Correspondence Board as quote, pardon

1512
01:20:47,640 --> 01:20:52,000
Speaker 3: me gay gay gay, Disney gay all one word, and

1513
01:20:52,200 --> 01:20:56,600
Speaker 3: claimed it made his brother leaves Aca a Jimmy embarrassed.

1514
01:20:57,920 --> 01:20:59,839
Speaker 1: Make of that and the offensive language.

1515
01:21:00,080 --> 01:21:03,640
Speaker 2: What you will I find Disney gay on a continuity

1516
01:21:03,920 --> 01:21:08,120
Speaker 2: with the brick and morty guy justin Royland. In some

1517
01:21:08,280 --> 01:21:12,040
Speaker 2: of his canceled he was canceled for being like a drunk,

1518
01:21:12,200 --> 01:21:15,240
Speaker 2: useless idiot and also like a sex pest, and in

1519
01:21:15,320 --> 01:21:19,240
Speaker 2: one of his grooming dms to Like a Young Woman,

1520
01:21:19,320 --> 01:21:23,599
Speaker 2: he described himself as Atlanta drunk, which I truly think

1521
01:21:23,760 --> 01:21:27,640
Speaker 2: needs to go into the lexicon. Like more so, we

1522
01:21:27,760 --> 01:21:31,559
Speaker 2: have to find the opposites of the level of.

1523
01:21:31,600 --> 01:21:38,320
Speaker 1: Drunk you get in Atlanta what I've ever been?

1524
01:21:39,439 --> 01:21:43,920
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I mean yeah, the city run by Coca

1525
01:21:43,960 --> 01:21:45,200
Speaker 2: Cola and strip clubs like.

1526
01:21:47,400 --> 01:21:48,320
Speaker 1: You get up there.

1527
01:21:50,600 --> 01:21:53,960
Speaker 2: Some of there's a continuity of Disney gay and Atlanta

1528
01:21:54,080 --> 01:21:57,680
Speaker 2: drunk in the thoughts of canceled white men.

1529
01:21:58,080 --> 01:21:59,520
Speaker 1: How do you feel about try Anastasia.

1530
01:22:00,040 --> 01:22:03,840
Speaker 2: I hate Fish. I understand it, and I will say

1531
01:22:03,920 --> 01:22:07,960
Speaker 2: this for their fans, they are fing tenacious. I have

1532
01:22:08,080 --> 01:22:11,240
Speaker 2: never had a subset of music fans try to bully

1533
01:22:11,400 --> 01:22:14,479
Speaker 2: me into liking their music that they like, except for

1534
01:22:14,600 --> 01:22:19,639
Speaker 2: reggae fans. If you tell me, oh, yeah.

1535
01:22:19,560 --> 01:22:21,600
Speaker 1: Dude, you've never gotten that.

1536
01:22:21,760 --> 01:22:23,160
Speaker 2: Like if you tell people like, yeah, I like, I

1537
01:22:23,200 --> 01:22:25,519
Speaker 2: don't really like reggae, like sort of the I mean,

1538
01:22:26,160 --> 01:22:29,320
Speaker 2: I guess I've gotten into dub, but like a lot

1539
01:22:29,360 --> 01:22:32,280
Speaker 2: of reggae, I find that like upstroke thing really kind

1540
01:22:32,320 --> 01:22:36,080
Speaker 2: of like oppressive and if it's not done by like

1541
01:22:36,400 --> 01:22:40,439
Speaker 2: the Masters, to be really grating and sort of it

1542
01:22:40,520 --> 01:22:43,640
Speaker 2: sounds like poka if you do it poorly. But yeah, man,

1543
01:22:43,840 --> 01:22:45,639
Speaker 2: whenever I tell people I don't really listen to reggae,

1544
01:22:45,680 --> 01:22:48,719
Speaker 2: they'd be like, oh, you just haven't heard Augustus Pablo

1545
01:22:48,880 --> 01:22:53,160
Speaker 2: meets the Uptown Rockers. You know, it's King Tubby. It

1546
01:22:53,320 --> 01:22:55,879
Speaker 2: sounds like it was recorded in like a deep mind shaft,

1547
01:22:56,040 --> 01:22:59,360
Speaker 2: and it's every song is twenty minutes long. And Fish

1548
01:22:59,400 --> 01:23:02,080
Speaker 2: fans are like that you know, Oh you haven't heard

1549
01:23:02,120 --> 01:23:08,440
Speaker 2: this like idiotic song about like some idiot cartoon protagonist.

1550
01:23:08,600 --> 01:23:10,439
Speaker 2: And then the version that they did on like March

1551
01:23:10,520 --> 01:23:13,960
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety two is thirty minutes long and has like

1552
01:23:14,080 --> 01:23:17,479
Speaker 2: seventeen covers welded into it, and just like everybody gets

1553
01:23:17,479 --> 01:23:19,880
Speaker 2: a great solo, but that's not as good as the

1554
01:23:19,960 --> 01:23:22,160
Speaker 2: one from like and they like they're like Grateful Dead

1555
01:23:22,200 --> 01:23:23,880
Speaker 2: fans in that way, like, yeah, I don't really like that.

1556
01:23:24,000 --> 01:23:26,920
Speaker 2: Oh have you heard this soundboard recording from March third,

1557
01:23:27,160 --> 01:23:30,120
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty nine, like it'll really change your life? But

1558
01:23:30,360 --> 01:23:34,000
Speaker 2: not the one from March second, you know, nineteen eighty one,

1559
01:23:34,160 --> 01:23:38,160
Speaker 2: completely different band. Donna Godshaw's in there, not really the best.

1560
01:23:38,160 --> 01:23:40,479
Speaker 2: It's not really fan of Donna, but you know, once

1561
01:23:40,520 --> 01:23:43,880
Speaker 2: you get into the Bruce Hornsby era of Live Dead,

1562
01:23:43,960 --> 01:23:46,760
Speaker 2: they really come into their own with a new professional

1563
01:23:46,920 --> 01:23:50,120
Speaker 2: sheen coming out of the keyboard corner.

1564
01:23:49,920 --> 01:23:51,000
Speaker 1: Like that's all these people talk.

1565
01:23:52,080 --> 01:23:56,000
Speaker 2: And I like the Grateful Dead not fish though, what

1566
01:23:56,200 --> 01:23:56,880
Speaker 2: was I talking about?

1567
01:24:00,120 --> 01:24:00,160
Speaker 1: You?

1568
01:24:03,280 --> 01:24:05,000
Speaker 2: You knew that I was going to do that. You

1569
01:24:05,240 --> 01:24:07,200
Speaker 2: baited me into a fish ramp.

1570
01:24:09,320 --> 01:24:14,000
Speaker 1: Mons. We call this in TMI circles Gone Fishing.

1571
01:24:17,240 --> 01:24:19,160
Speaker 3: We're going to take a quick break, but we'll be

1572
01:24:19,280 --> 01:24:22,080
Speaker 3: right back with more too much information in just a moment.

1573
01:24:33,600 --> 01:24:36,519
Speaker 3: Although mixing Weezer's Blue Album, which you'll recall us what

1574
01:24:36,640 --> 01:24:41,000
Speaker 3: this episode is actually about, went over budget, the album

1575
01:24:41,280 --> 01:24:44,160
Speaker 3: Weezer's Blue Album was done and in the can, and

1576
01:24:44,280 --> 01:24:47,120
Speaker 3: the band returned to La to embark on an intensive

1577
01:24:47,240 --> 01:24:50,639
Speaker 3: series of local shows intended to break in new guitarist

1578
01:24:50,720 --> 01:24:55,120
Speaker 3: Brian bell Bill has an amazing recollection of his first

1579
01:24:55,160 --> 01:24:57,679
Speaker 3: show at the band. He would say, my parents came.

1580
01:24:57,800 --> 01:25:00,840
Speaker 3: It was a big moment. Afterwards, Rivers and I hugged

1581
01:25:00,920 --> 01:25:03,800
Speaker 3: for the first and last time. It was the most

1582
01:25:03,800 --> 01:25:06,160
Speaker 3: awkward thing in the world. I think I told them,

1583
01:25:06,439 --> 01:25:08,400
Speaker 3: don't worry, that'll never happen again.

1584
01:25:08,720 --> 01:25:08,920
Speaker 1: Ah.

1585
01:25:11,080 --> 01:25:14,320
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, Geffen Records kept pushing the album's release date back,

1586
01:25:14,560 --> 01:25:16,800
Speaker 3: but they did at least pony up the cash for

1587
01:25:17,120 --> 01:25:20,559
Speaker 3: esteemed pit up photographer Peter Gowland to shoot the now

1588
01:25:20,800 --> 01:25:24,320
Speaker 3: iconic cover image of the album. Cuomo told the La

1589
01:25:24,439 --> 01:25:27,240
Speaker 3: Times the night before I went to some random salon

1590
01:25:27,360 --> 01:25:29,720
Speaker 3: and said, give me a haircut, and that's what they

1591
01:25:29,800 --> 01:25:34,240
Speaker 3: gave me. It totally sucks, but now that's me for eternity.

1592
01:25:34,320 --> 01:25:35,120
Speaker 1: In every meme.

1593
01:25:36,840 --> 01:25:39,200
Speaker 3: The original conception for the cover was for the band

1594
01:25:39,280 --> 01:25:42,439
Speaker 3: to be in matching striped shirts, like my beloved Beach Boys,

1595
01:25:42,840 --> 01:25:45,439
Speaker 3: but they all ended up wearing basically their street clothes.

1596
01:25:46,120 --> 01:25:48,760
Speaker 1: What did you read about the specific Beach Boys cover

1597
01:25:48,880 --> 01:25:49,479
Speaker 1: that it comes from.

1598
01:25:50,000 --> 01:25:54,000
Speaker 2: No, this is fascinating because I think you'll connect with

1599
01:25:54,080 --> 01:25:57,080
Speaker 2: it on a granular level at some point. And they

1600
01:25:57,200 --> 01:26:00,799
Speaker 2: have the actual picture of this greatest Hits collection Rivers

1601
01:26:01,320 --> 01:26:03,320
Speaker 2: or I think it was Rivers. He found like a

1602
01:26:03,439 --> 01:26:08,040
Speaker 2: cassette only greatest Hits collection that's just called like best

1603
01:26:08,080 --> 01:26:09,840
Speaker 2: of the Beach Boys or something, and it was it

1604
01:26:10,000 --> 01:26:13,160
Speaker 2: was never issued on like CD, it was like or vinyl.

1605
01:26:13,280 --> 01:26:14,960
Speaker 2: It was one of those things that was like in

1606
01:26:15,080 --> 01:26:18,840
Speaker 2: a gas station, bar Bin and he carried the CD around,

1607
01:26:18,960 --> 01:26:20,400
Speaker 2: was like, this is what the album needs to be.

1608
01:26:20,680 --> 01:26:22,960
Speaker 2: So they all got these matching striped shirts, much like

1609
01:26:23,040 --> 01:26:25,920
Speaker 2: ones that I assume you own in multiples warm for

1610
01:26:26,000 --> 01:26:29,519
Speaker 2: our bands, and they played, they played a whole show

1611
01:26:29,640 --> 01:26:32,840
Speaker 2: in these shirts and like, but then when it came

1612
01:26:32,920 --> 01:26:34,720
Speaker 2: time to shoot it, they abandoned the idea and just

1613
01:26:34,760 --> 01:26:38,680
Speaker 2: wore their regular street clothes. It's also I think they

1614
01:26:38,760 --> 01:26:41,200
Speaker 2: got for one point, it's also very similar to an

1615
01:26:41,560 --> 01:26:44,360
Speaker 2: album by the Feelies, the band had not listen to

1616
01:26:44,479 --> 01:26:47,000
Speaker 2: at this point, which I get like they that was

1617
01:26:47,240 --> 01:26:50,439
Speaker 2: That's an obscure band kind of even now, much less

1618
01:26:50,479 --> 01:26:51,920
Speaker 2: back in than pre internet days.

1619
01:26:52,880 --> 01:26:54,559
Speaker 3: But for the blue for the cover, it took them

1620
01:26:54,720 --> 01:26:59,680
Speaker 3: two days to find the right shade, which, unsurprisingly, as

1621
01:26:59,720 --> 01:27:02,639
Speaker 3: we've learned thus far in this episode, it's connected back

1622
01:27:02,680 --> 01:27:06,320
Speaker 3: to Rivers childhood. He wrote on his website in twenty twenty.

1623
01:27:06,760 --> 01:27:09,080
Speaker 3: My parents said I could paint my room any color

1624
01:27:09,160 --> 01:27:13,040
Speaker 3: I wanted. I painted it my favorite color, a specific.

1625
01:27:12,640 --> 01:27:13,360
Speaker 1: Shade of blue.

1626
01:27:14,200 --> 01:27:15,920
Speaker 3: When I was thinking about a cover for the first

1627
01:27:15,960 --> 01:27:18,679
Speaker 3: Weezer album, I wanted it to be that same shade

1628
01:27:18,720 --> 01:27:22,320
Speaker 3: of blue. This mode of nostalgia for the lost innocence

1629
01:27:22,360 --> 01:27:25,080
Speaker 3: of childhood was the same source of my look in

1630
01:27:25,160 --> 01:27:28,959
Speaker 3: the blue album era, the glasses frames, bowl cut, Dicky's

1631
01:27:29,120 --> 01:27:32,320
Speaker 3: blue T shirt, and windbreaker for my childhood photos.

1632
01:27:33,560 --> 01:27:33,840
Speaker 1: Wow.

1633
01:27:34,000 --> 01:27:38,920
Speaker 3: Man, the idea for this album cover did not thrill

1634
01:27:39,040 --> 01:27:42,599
Speaker 3: the record label FNA and r Rep. Todd Sullivan recalled,

1635
01:27:42,880 --> 01:27:44,840
Speaker 3: I remember that I had been shown the cover of

1636
01:27:44,920 --> 01:27:47,160
Speaker 3: some Beach Boys album, and what caught my eye was

1637
01:27:47,200 --> 01:27:49,640
Speaker 3: that they were all in striped shirts and a blue background.

1638
01:27:50,120 --> 01:27:53,280
Speaker 3: It looked like some sixty sears family photo. It was

1639
01:27:53,360 --> 01:27:58,160
Speaker 3: a shock, like, oh okay again all comes back to

1640
01:27:58,200 --> 01:27:58,799
Speaker 3: his childhood.

1641
01:27:58,840 --> 01:28:02,200
Speaker 1: Man. Yeah, I've read that Matt Sharp didn't like I

1642
01:28:02,320 --> 01:28:02,960
Speaker 1: was face looked.

1643
01:28:03,000 --> 01:28:05,840
Speaker 2: So either the photographer or something that Geffen like just

1644
01:28:06,040 --> 01:28:09,040
Speaker 2: photo like flew in in an alternate with photoshop.

1645
01:28:09,479 --> 01:28:11,000
Speaker 1: But I don't know.

1646
01:28:11,160 --> 01:28:14,800
Speaker 2: I didn't read that anywhere other than your article and Wikipedia,

1647
01:28:15,040 --> 01:28:18,080
Speaker 2: So make of that what you will.

1648
01:28:18,800 --> 01:28:19,320
Speaker 1: Anyway.

1649
01:28:19,600 --> 01:28:22,400
Speaker 2: The Blue album finally dropped on May tenth, nineteen ninety four,

1650
01:28:22,479 --> 01:28:25,320
Speaker 2: a month after Kirk Cobain's suicide and weeks after Live

1651
01:28:25,400 --> 01:28:28,960
Speaker 2: Through This by Courtney Love's band Hole and Kirk Cobain's

1652
01:28:28,960 --> 01:28:32,280
Speaker 2: Widow came out, an album that, if you believe certain

1653
01:28:33,080 --> 01:28:37,080
Speaker 2: conspiracy theories, was either co written by or mostly written

1654
01:28:37,160 --> 01:28:38,439
Speaker 2: by Kurt or Billy Corgan.

1655
01:28:38,840 --> 01:28:40,479
Speaker 1: Right, is that the that?

1656
01:28:41,080 --> 01:28:45,160
Speaker 2: Yeah? Anyway. H Wheezer's out of Nowhere major label deal

1657
01:28:45,280 --> 01:28:47,920
Speaker 2: drew suspicious looks from the alt rock community, who accused

1658
01:28:47,960 --> 01:28:49,920
Speaker 2: them of being an industry plant, given that they hadn't

1659
01:28:49,920 --> 01:28:52,880
Speaker 2: followed the traditional route of heavy underground touring and the

1660
01:28:52,920 --> 01:28:56,639
Speaker 2: series of independent releases before signing with Geffen. One review

1661
01:28:56,760 --> 01:28:59,920
Speaker 2: that they all apparently remember called them Stone Temple pick

1662
01:29:00,760 --> 01:29:03,320
Speaker 2: which is an extremely niche pun that I will now

1663
01:29:03,360 --> 01:29:06,280
Speaker 2: explain to you. Stone Temple Pilots were seen as the

1664
01:29:06,400 --> 01:29:09,639
Speaker 2: radio friendly, super slick Johnny come Lately to the grunge

1665
01:29:09,680 --> 01:29:12,719
Speaker 2: trend because Scott Wiland used to sing in a chesty

1666
01:29:12,840 --> 01:29:17,599
Speaker 2: baritone much like Eddie Vedder before they really revealed themselves

1667
01:29:17,600 --> 01:29:22,000
Speaker 2: as weird seventies fixated like glam rockers on some of

1668
01:29:22,000 --> 01:29:25,760
Speaker 2: the albums that nobody listens to. Stone Teple Pilots are

1669
01:29:25,760 --> 01:29:30,040
Speaker 2: a great band, all of you. And it could also

1670
01:29:30,160 --> 01:29:34,160
Speaker 2: possibly be a reference to Pixies signing with Elektra after

1671
01:29:34,560 --> 01:29:37,200
Speaker 2: the Come On Pilgrim EP and the wild success of

1672
01:29:37,320 --> 01:29:40,000
Speaker 2: Surfer Rosa, which was an independent I think it came.

1673
01:29:39,960 --> 01:29:40,760
Speaker 1: Out on four A D.

1674
01:29:42,160 --> 01:29:44,560
Speaker 2: So there's a couple of different things that you have

1675
01:29:44,680 --> 01:29:47,000
Speaker 2: to go around in your head there. But then there's

1676
01:29:47,000 --> 01:29:50,800
Speaker 2: the also interpretation that it could be calling Weezer the

1677
01:29:50,920 --> 01:29:54,640
Speaker 2: Stone Temple Pilot's version of the Pixies, which is just

1678
01:29:54,760 --> 01:29:57,040
Speaker 2: so bizarre to me, because how the do you listen

1679
01:29:57,080 --> 01:30:00,439
Speaker 2: to blue album and think, yes, this it sounds like

1680
01:30:00,600 --> 01:30:05,240
Speaker 2: Airsat's Pixies. Like what music critic was high enough on

1681
01:30:05,280 --> 01:30:08,640
Speaker 2: their own supply to make that connection. Anyway, That's not

1682
01:30:08,720 --> 01:30:10,599
Speaker 2: a job you can have anymore, so it doesn't matter

1683
01:30:12,439 --> 01:30:16,400
Speaker 2: shout out to Conde Nast. Consequently, the record didn't really

1684
01:30:16,439 --> 01:30:18,479
Speaker 2: pick up until The Sweater Song started to pick up

1685
01:30:18,520 --> 01:30:20,840
Speaker 2: on college radio back when there was such a thing

1686
01:30:21,600 --> 01:30:25,160
Speaker 2: and they were taste makers, and then hip modern rock

1687
01:30:25,240 --> 01:30:28,720
Speaker 2: radio station like LA's K Rock and Seattle's The End

1688
01:30:29,360 --> 01:30:31,840
Speaker 2: started picking it up as well, again a tract no

1689
01:30:31,960 --> 01:30:35,760
Speaker 2: longer available to up and coming bands. There were no

1690
01:30:35,880 --> 01:30:37,760
Speaker 2: videos when the album was released. There wasn't even a

1691
01:30:37,800 --> 01:30:41,000
Speaker 2: single fifth wheez. Carl Koch told Magnet it was really

1692
01:30:41,040 --> 01:30:42,960
Speaker 2: hard to get Geffen to spend a dollar without seeing

1693
01:30:43,000 --> 01:30:45,800
Speaker 2: some potential. And the potential came when Undone started getting

1694
01:30:45,840 --> 01:30:48,400
Speaker 2: played on the radio in Seattle, and then modern rock

1695
01:30:48,479 --> 01:30:51,519
Speaker 2: stations all over started following suit, and Geffen was like, Okay,

1696
01:30:51,720 --> 01:30:53,960
Speaker 2: we need to make a video. The band was initially

1697
01:30:54,000 --> 01:30:56,320
Speaker 2: reticent to make one at all, but they wound up

1698
01:30:56,320 --> 01:30:59,000
Speaker 2: in touch with Spike Jones, who they knew, I think

1699
01:30:59,080 --> 01:31:02,679
Speaker 2: vaguely from like their circles. According to the La Times,

1700
01:31:03,040 --> 01:31:05,360
Speaker 2: Spike Jones told the band, look, a music video can

1701
01:31:05,400 --> 01:31:07,320
Speaker 2: be anything. It doesn't have to be what you think

1702
01:31:07,360 --> 01:31:09,599
Speaker 2: it is. It could be as perfect and simple as

1703
01:31:09,640 --> 01:31:12,320
Speaker 2: your album cover. Just you guys playing against a blue wall,

1704
01:31:12,520 --> 01:31:15,479
Speaker 2: singing or half singing, or not singing at all. And

1705
01:31:15,880 --> 01:31:18,920
Speaker 2: Jones's recollection of the phone conversations. Then the Rivers said,

1706
01:31:19,040 --> 01:31:21,400
Speaker 2: but then what happens? And Jones says, I don't know.

1707
01:31:21,520 --> 01:31:23,920
Speaker 2: A bunch of dogs run through at the end, and

1708
01:31:24,040 --> 01:31:25,960
Speaker 2: he said, I wasn't pitching an idea so much as

1709
01:31:26,000 --> 01:31:27,920
Speaker 2: I was just saying that you could make anything out

1710
01:31:27,960 --> 01:31:31,639
Speaker 2: of a music video. But the rest of the pitches

1711
01:31:31,680 --> 01:31:34,240
Speaker 2: that they'd gotten for music video directors were like apparently

1712
01:31:34,439 --> 01:31:36,000
Speaker 2: just them being like, all right, we're gonna wrap you

1713
01:31:36,080 --> 01:31:39,600
Speaker 2: up at a giant sweater and then it's gonna unravel

1714
01:31:39,680 --> 01:31:40,800
Speaker 2: throughout the course of the song.

1715
01:31:41,320 --> 01:31:42,680
Speaker 1: You know, get it.

1716
01:31:43,240 --> 01:31:46,040
Speaker 2: Spike Jones were called the same day he had that meeting,

1717
01:31:46,479 --> 01:31:49,200
Speaker 2: Matt Sharp called him again and was like, Rivers wants

1718
01:31:49,240 --> 01:31:52,120
Speaker 2: you to do the video you pitched, and Spike joneses like,

1719
01:31:52,280 --> 01:31:54,760
Speaker 2: what video? And Matt Sharper was like, you know with

1720
01:31:54,920 --> 01:32:01,240
Speaker 2: the dogs running around, Oh, it's also funny to hilariously enough,

1721
01:32:01,320 --> 01:32:03,519
Speaker 2: On the day of the video shoot, guitarist Brian Bell

1722
01:32:03,680 --> 01:32:05,800
Speaker 2: still very much. The new guy in the band were

1723
01:32:05,840 --> 01:32:08,800
Speaker 2: called to The La Times. I'm not sure if I

1724
01:32:08,960 --> 01:32:13,320
Speaker 2: was told the dogs were going to come out. Carl

1725
01:32:13,439 --> 01:32:15,439
Speaker 2: Kanch recalled, we couldn't get the dogs to do what

1726
01:32:15,479 --> 01:32:17,280
Speaker 2: we wanted them to do. It was a big room

1727
01:32:17,320 --> 01:32:18,880
Speaker 2: with loud music blaring, so it was hard to get

1728
01:32:18,920 --> 01:32:21,040
Speaker 2: them to hit their marks, and you had like fifteen

1729
01:32:21,080 --> 01:32:23,200
Speaker 2: different trainers trying to tell their dog which way to go.

1730
01:32:23,680 --> 01:32:25,400
Speaker 2: At one point, one of the dogs came over and

1731
01:32:25,439 --> 01:32:28,160
Speaker 2: crapped on Pat's drum pedal. At that point we realized

1732
01:32:28,200 --> 01:32:30,080
Speaker 2: this was ridiculous and we should just let everyone do

1733
01:32:30,160 --> 01:32:33,400
Speaker 2: whatever they wanted, dogs included, and it will be fun.

1734
01:32:34,920 --> 01:32:38,479
Speaker 3: The video hit MTV and earned their coveted buzz clip status,

1735
01:32:38,760 --> 01:32:41,320
Speaker 3: which repelled them to a second video with Jones at

1736
01:32:41,360 --> 01:32:44,320
Speaker 3: the Helm, which wound up being their iconic video for

1737
01:32:44,520 --> 01:32:48,200
Speaker 3: Buddy Holly, which saw the band intercut into an episode

1738
01:32:48,280 --> 01:32:52,360
Speaker 3: of My beloved Happy Days. Jones recalled as creative process

1739
01:32:52,479 --> 01:32:54,840
Speaker 3: for coming up with a video concept to The La Times,

1740
01:32:55,439 --> 01:32:57,360
Speaker 3: the way I come up with ideas for videos is

1741
01:32:57,439 --> 01:32:59,560
Speaker 3: I listened to a song over and over again and

1742
01:32:59,640 --> 01:33:04,680
Speaker 3: write every idea I have, bad, good, stupid, whatever with

1743
01:33:04,840 --> 01:33:07,599
Speaker 3: buddy Holly, I just wrote down Happy Days.

1744
01:33:07,600 --> 01:33:09,280
Speaker 1: At some point, Fifth.

1745
01:33:09,120 --> 01:33:12,479
Speaker 3: Weezer Carl Koch said that Rivers wasn't convinced, but he

1746
01:33:12,600 --> 01:33:15,920
Speaker 3: was hardly the heaviest lift for the video. That was

1747
01:33:16,160 --> 01:33:18,400
Speaker 3: getting all the Happy Days people to sign off on it,

1748
01:33:18,479 --> 01:33:22,439
Speaker 3: which wasn't easy. Sharp recalled and Blender Potsy didn't want

1749
01:33:22,479 --> 01:33:25,519
Speaker 3: to have anything to do with it, and David Geffen

1750
01:33:25,640 --> 01:33:30,040
Speaker 3: himself wrote Potsy actor Anson Williams a personal letter. But

1751
01:33:30,120 --> 01:33:34,559
Speaker 3: the turning point came when Henry Ponzie Winkler signed off

1752
01:33:34,640 --> 01:33:37,120
Speaker 3: on the idea and everyone fell in line.

1753
01:33:37,280 --> 01:33:37,519
Speaker 1: Yep.

1754
01:33:38,160 --> 01:33:42,519
Speaker 3: Sharp continued to Magnet Magazine. The cast apprehensive at first,

1755
01:33:42,600 --> 01:33:45,120
Speaker 3: but when the fawn said I'm in, everyone else said

1756
01:33:45,680 --> 01:33:48,800
Speaker 3: fawn says, It's cool. It's cool words to live by.

1757
01:33:50,000 --> 01:33:53,080
Speaker 3: Following the two day shoot, Jones began splicing the new

1758
01:33:53,160 --> 01:33:56,559
Speaker 3: footage he shot with vintage Happy Day scenes, mostly called

1759
01:33:56,600 --> 01:33:57,800
Speaker 3: from episode.

1760
01:33:57,439 --> 01:34:00,479
Speaker 1: Number fifty three. They call it Potts Love.

1761
01:34:01,160 --> 01:34:03,880
Speaker 3: Shout out to my buddy Paul Anka and the Paul

1762
01:34:03,920 --> 01:34:06,960
Speaker 3: Anka Our White podcast who wrote they call it Puppy Love.

1763
01:34:08,560 --> 01:34:10,920
Speaker 1: Yeah there, and I found it. Yeah there it is.

1764
01:34:11,240 --> 01:34:14,360
Speaker 1: Henry Winkler aka Fawnsie later told Bunder. I was happy

1765
01:34:14,400 --> 01:34:18,160
Speaker 1: to do it. The fawns would have had Weezer on vinyl.

1766
01:34:18,920 --> 01:34:21,880
Speaker 1: I love how Henry Winkler, he is in no way

1767
01:34:22,000 --> 01:34:24,760
Speaker 1: cool in real life, is like like a Shakespeare story

1768
01:34:24,800 --> 01:34:25,799
Speaker 1: and actor or something.

1769
01:34:26,000 --> 01:34:30,320
Speaker 2: Tiny, tiny little man who's just got great comedic chops

1770
01:34:30,400 --> 01:34:35,000
Speaker 2: and was somehow the coolest guy on television for a while.

1771
01:34:35,720 --> 01:34:38,599
Speaker 1: I feel like John Lennon crashed the happy Days set

1772
01:34:38,640 --> 01:34:40,519
Speaker 1: in the seventies when he was living out in la

1773
01:34:40,800 --> 01:34:42,519
Speaker 1: I think he brought his son Julian too.

1774
01:34:42,680 --> 01:34:45,639
Speaker 2: Like I gotta meet Pozzi, I got I gotta meet fawns,

1775
01:34:45,720 --> 01:34:46,840
Speaker 2: Fawns and the Pozzi.

1776
01:34:46,600 --> 01:34:49,800
Speaker 1: Pots and Potzy Ralph Mouth. Why was he never the.

1777
01:34:49,880 --> 01:34:53,800
Speaker 2: Pozzi the Fawns. Yeah, because I already had the one

1778
01:34:53,840 --> 01:34:54,880
Speaker 2: guy with a definite article.

1779
01:34:55,000 --> 01:34:57,160
Speaker 3: That's a good question, I guess you can. Really Yeah,

1780
01:34:57,240 --> 01:35:00,280
Speaker 3: that's probably a big part of it. But Potts is

1781
01:35:00,360 --> 01:35:04,920
Speaker 3: that was that his last name, Potsy Weber. It was

1782
01:35:05,000 --> 01:35:08,599
Speaker 3: just his Nauren Potzy Weber. No, No, it was Potzy

1783
01:35:08,720 --> 01:35:09,400
Speaker 3: was his nickname?

1784
01:35:09,920 --> 01:35:09,960
Speaker 2: Is?

1785
01:35:10,240 --> 01:35:12,920
Speaker 1: Say? Did you get that nickname? Think? Oh, here we go.

1786
01:35:13,320 --> 01:35:16,559
Speaker 3: In Deadly Dare's season one episode six, Potsy revealed how

1787
01:35:16,600 --> 01:35:19,439
Speaker 3: he got his nickname he was asked, Potzy Webber, what

1788
01:35:19,640 --> 01:35:22,160
Speaker 3: kind of name is this? He replied, They called me

1789
01:35:22,280 --> 01:35:24,920
Speaker 3: Potzy because when I was a young boy, I used

1790
01:35:24,920 --> 01:35:27,280
Speaker 3: to like to make things with clay, and one day

1791
01:35:27,360 --> 01:35:28,799
Speaker 3: my mother called me Potzy.

1792
01:35:29,280 --> 01:35:30,840
Speaker 1: That was not where I thought that was going.

1793
01:35:30,880 --> 01:35:34,839
Speaker 3: I thought it was something evolving a toilet, how honestly,

1794
01:35:35,280 --> 01:35:36,800
Speaker 3: how deeply uninteresting?

1795
01:35:37,080 --> 01:35:37,320
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1796
01:35:37,479 --> 01:35:42,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, Back to Arthur Fonzarelli, or Henry Wrinkler as he's

1797
01:35:42,840 --> 01:35:46,000
Speaker 3: known in Not Happy Day's Lore, he wasn't the only

1798
01:35:46,080 --> 01:35:49,040
Speaker 3: seventies TV icon who appreciated the attention from the song.

1799
01:35:50,200 --> 01:35:53,280
Speaker 3: Pat Sharp said that Mary Tyler sent us each framed

1800
01:35:53,439 --> 01:35:55,400
Speaker 3: personalized autographed pictures.

1801
01:35:55,680 --> 01:36:00,280
Speaker 2: I love that. Yeah, that was cool, A big moment

1802
01:36:00,400 --> 01:36:00,920
Speaker 2: for all of them.

1803
01:36:01,120 --> 01:36:05,519
Speaker 3: Spike Jones and his editor Eric Zumbrunnen reverse engineered the

1804
01:36:05,600 --> 01:36:08,960
Speaker 3: process of sticking the band into Happy Days. They spent

1805
01:36:09,160 --> 01:36:12,760
Speaker 3: hours compiling a skeleton of old Happy Day shots to

1806
01:36:12,920 --> 01:36:16,040
Speaker 3: drop the band into, but in the end, there's actually

1807
01:36:16,120 --> 01:36:18,840
Speaker 3: no CGI in this video, just a lot of clever

1808
01:36:19,040 --> 01:36:22,799
Speaker 3: old school editing techniques. The only new footage from anyone

1809
01:36:22,880 --> 01:36:25,840
Speaker 3: in the Happy Days crew is from Al Molnaro, who

1810
01:36:25,880 --> 01:36:29,080
Speaker 3: plays the drive In's owner, also named Al Aldavecchio and

1811
01:36:29,160 --> 01:36:33,679
Speaker 3: who introduces the group by saying Kenosha, Wisconsin's own Weezer.

1812
01:36:34,080 --> 01:36:35,960
Speaker 3: The clip was one of the most popular of nineteen

1813
01:36:36,040 --> 01:36:39,519
Speaker 3: ninety five, earning four MTV Video Music Awards and two

1814
01:36:39,640 --> 01:36:41,200
Speaker 3: Billboard Music Video Awards.

1815
01:36:42,200 --> 01:36:42,400
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1816
01:36:42,479 --> 01:36:45,360
Speaker 2: I remember in one of these interviews. I didn't put

1817
01:36:45,400 --> 01:36:48,000
Speaker 2: it in, but they talked about how CNN or ABC

1818
01:36:48,200 --> 01:36:53,799
Speaker 2: somebody ran a special on like CGI new trend overtaking Hollywood,

1819
01:36:53,840 --> 01:36:56,559
Speaker 2: and they included the Buddy Holly video even though there's

1820
01:36:56,600 --> 01:36:59,000
Speaker 2: no CGI in it. Like that was Jones' whole thing

1821
01:36:59,120 --> 01:37:01,680
Speaker 2: was just using block and editing and like all the

1822
01:37:01,760 --> 01:37:03,800
Speaker 2: old school techniques that you would have to get this

1823
01:37:04,200 --> 01:37:07,120
Speaker 2: and cutting like to get this effect, and people thought

1824
01:37:07,160 --> 01:37:07,799
Speaker 2: it was CGI.

1825
01:37:08,120 --> 01:37:12,360
Speaker 1: I would believe that, like it's exactly I yeah, that

1826
01:37:12,520 --> 01:37:12,960
Speaker 1: is wild.

1827
01:37:13,479 --> 01:37:17,360
Speaker 3: The third and somewhat forgotten pillar of Geffen's promotional strategy

1828
01:37:17,439 --> 01:37:20,519
Speaker 3: for Weezer was negotiating to have the Buddy Holly clip

1829
01:37:20,680 --> 01:37:24,679
Speaker 3: included on the installation CD ROM for Windows ninety five,

1830
01:37:25,600 --> 01:37:28,639
Speaker 3: a sort of proto U two force installing an album

1831
01:37:28,720 --> 01:37:29,360
Speaker 3: on your phone.

1832
01:37:29,439 --> 01:37:31,200
Speaker 1: Move. But I don't remember this.

1833
01:37:31,720 --> 01:37:34,479
Speaker 2: I remember the arrival of Windows Me too. I've in

1834
01:37:34,600 --> 01:37:35,240
Speaker 2: my household.

1835
01:37:35,560 --> 01:37:36,200
Speaker 1: That's so weird.

1836
01:37:36,280 --> 01:37:38,360
Speaker 3: I was just telling I think I was just telling

1837
01:37:38,439 --> 01:37:41,439
Speaker 3: my brothers about this, Like I it was like the

1838
01:37:41,520 --> 01:37:43,840
Speaker 3: way our parents talk about like getting their first TV

1839
01:37:44,120 --> 01:37:44,600
Speaker 3: or something like.

1840
01:37:44,680 --> 01:37:47,320
Speaker 1: I remember bringing it home. I remember that that.

1841
01:37:47,400 --> 01:37:49,120
Speaker 3: I remember it was Friday night because in the other

1842
01:37:49,240 --> 01:37:52,400
Speaker 3: room TGIF was playing like Family Matters or something.

1843
01:37:52,439 --> 01:37:55,200
Speaker 2: And I remember all that Ryan Eno designed sound c

1844
01:37:55,640 --> 01:37:58,479
Speaker 2: welcoming you into the new century that you would then

1845
01:37:58,760 --> 01:38:02,680
Speaker 2: yearn to hopefully one day escape, and turned back the

1846
01:38:02,760 --> 01:38:06,000
Speaker 2: clock into a wonderful pre digital era when we weren't

1847
01:38:06,000 --> 01:38:07,400
Speaker 2: all insane and stupid.

1848
01:38:08,880 --> 01:38:13,000
Speaker 1: Do you remember this? This may blow your attention span. No,

1849
01:38:13,520 --> 01:38:13,960
Speaker 1: I don't.

1850
01:38:15,479 --> 01:38:18,720
Speaker 3: Do you remember the like startup disc they gave you

1851
01:38:19,680 --> 01:38:24,120
Speaker 3: was hosted by Dennis Miller? Do you remember this that vaguely?

1852
01:38:24,400 --> 01:38:26,840
Speaker 2: Like a vaguely, but I don't think I ever watched it.

1853
01:38:27,080 --> 01:38:27,639
Speaker 1: Oh, I remember.

1854
01:38:27,720 --> 01:38:29,640
Speaker 3: We all say it was like the story of like

1855
01:38:29,920 --> 01:38:32,120
Speaker 3: looking up the TV, put the disc in and let

1856
01:38:32,160 --> 01:38:32,519
Speaker 3: it play.

1857
01:38:32,560 --> 01:38:34,799
Speaker 1: It was the weirdest we had an MS DOS computer.

1858
01:38:35,360 --> 01:38:40,920
Speaker 2: Dennis Miller's smarmy pinched voice tell yeah, yeah, No.

1859
01:38:41,720 --> 01:38:45,240
Speaker 3: The fact that there was like anything vaguely resembling a

1860
01:38:45,400 --> 01:38:48,600
Speaker 3: video on a computer screen in nineteen ninety five or

1861
01:38:48,840 --> 01:38:51,679
Speaker 3: six or whatever. It was sure to our minds because

1862
01:38:51,720 --> 01:38:54,400
Speaker 3: before that we had an MS Doss computer, we had

1863
01:38:54,479 --> 01:38:57,680
Speaker 3: a tiny tapper, and Frogger was like the highlight of

1864
01:38:58,200 --> 01:39:00,200
Speaker 3: I don't even think we had like Doom or any

1865
01:39:00,200 --> 01:39:03,200
Speaker 3: of the three D like first person things. That was incredible.

1866
01:39:03,439 --> 01:39:05,720
Speaker 3: But yeah, I don't remember, don't remember the Buddy Holly clip.

1867
01:39:05,840 --> 01:39:09,599
Speaker 3: I would have, and I would have very much remembered that. Yeah, exactly,

1868
01:39:10,240 --> 01:39:14,400
Speaker 3: damn it, Phil, I know he listens to these, my dad.

1869
01:39:15,479 --> 01:39:15,840
Speaker 3: I could have.

1870
01:39:15,960 --> 01:39:18,000
Speaker 2: I could have gotten in on the ground floor for Weezer.

1871
01:39:18,680 --> 01:39:20,439
Speaker 2: Maybe he saved me though, because then I would have

1872
01:39:20,479 --> 01:39:21,320
Speaker 2: become a Weezer guy.

1873
01:39:21,880 --> 01:39:26,479
Speaker 3: Oh hilariously, Nobe and Weezer had a computer at that time,

1874
01:39:27,000 --> 01:39:29,600
Speaker 3: so they had no idea what a big deal this was,

1875
01:39:30,400 --> 01:39:32,400
Speaker 3: which feels like a very Weezer story.

1876
01:39:32,640 --> 01:39:33,599
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly right.

1877
01:39:34,880 --> 01:39:37,160
Speaker 3: So all three of these efforts, these music videos and

1878
01:39:37,320 --> 01:39:43,000
Speaker 3: this Windows ninety five cameo combined, and Weezer went from

1879
01:39:43,040 --> 01:39:46,719
Speaker 3: playing empty rooms to being a legitimate phenomenon, which obviously

1880
01:39:46,880 --> 01:39:50,639
Speaker 3: was a trip for everyone involved, especially Rivers Cuomo, who

1881
01:39:50,720 --> 01:39:53,040
Speaker 3: seemed to have been completely unaware.

1882
01:39:52,640 --> 01:39:55,600
Speaker 1: That Weezer would be perceived as a nerdy band. You

1883
01:39:55,760 --> 01:39:56,599
Speaker 1: mentioned this earlier.

1884
01:39:57,200 --> 01:39:59,400
Speaker 3: I seriously thought that we were the next Nirvana, he

1885
01:39:59,439 --> 01:40:02,160
Speaker 3: admitted the Rolling Stone, and I thought the world was

1886
01:40:02,200 --> 01:40:05,679
Speaker 3: gonna perceive us that way, like a super important, super powerful,

1887
01:40:06,280 --> 01:40:11,719
Speaker 3: heartbreaking heavy rock band and as such serious artists. That's

1888
01:40:11,800 --> 01:40:15,760
Speaker 3: how I saw us. The realization that this wasn't the

1889
01:40:15,920 --> 01:40:19,880
Speaker 3: case quote was just like a gut punch, and that's

1890
01:40:19,920 --> 01:40:22,639
Speaker 3: when I started to realize the world wasn't gonna see

1891
01:40:22,680 --> 01:40:25,960
Speaker 3: Wheezer like I did, and the world wasn't gonna see the.

1892
01:40:25,960 --> 01:40:29,880
Speaker 1: Blue Album like I did. It's so heartbreaking but so

1893
01:40:30,600 --> 01:40:31,800
Speaker 1: hilarious to me.

1894
01:40:32,000 --> 01:40:34,760
Speaker 2: Again, this is not like a band that was like

1895
01:40:36,000 --> 01:40:40,280
Speaker 2: Alice in Chains or like Screaming Trees or any of

1896
01:40:40,360 --> 01:40:42,439
Speaker 2: these bands that came out of the grunge ara that

1897
01:40:42,600 --> 01:40:47,320
Speaker 2: could have that were like sufficiently dark and like heavy

1898
01:40:47,560 --> 01:40:50,760
Speaker 2: to reckon with the legacy of stuff like Bleach and

1899
01:40:50,960 --> 01:40:54,400
Speaker 2: in Utero. And then Rivers is out here being like

1900
01:40:54,960 --> 01:40:59,479
Speaker 2: earnestly making comparisons to Buddy Holly and having a Happy

1901
01:40:59,560 --> 01:41:03,360
Speaker 2: Day's theme video, and he's like literally describes himself as

1902
01:41:03,400 --> 01:41:06,880
Speaker 2: having the wind knocked out of him by realizing that

1903
01:41:07,000 --> 01:41:10,679
Speaker 2: his band was not going to be the next Servan.

1904
01:41:10,880 --> 01:41:14,760
Speaker 2: There's such a disconnect there. I love, I crave that

1905
01:41:14,920 --> 01:41:17,519
Speaker 2: in my own life, being able to make art, like

1906
01:41:18,280 --> 01:41:20,400
Speaker 2: not having any idea of how it would be received.

1907
01:41:20,840 --> 01:41:23,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, or at least so self beautiful.

1908
01:41:24,240 --> 01:41:26,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's yeah, in a way, we should all

1909
01:41:26,920 --> 01:41:31,000
Speaker 2: be so self delusional when we're creating. Anyway, whatever the

1910
01:41:31,080 --> 01:41:34,080
Speaker 2: perception was, the material effect was undeniable. The record was

1911
01:41:34,120 --> 01:41:36,960
Speaker 2: certified gold and just under seven months after its release

1912
01:41:37,040 --> 01:41:40,840
Speaker 2: on December one, nineteen ninety four, certified platinum. Just thirteen

1913
01:41:40,920 --> 01:41:44,519
Speaker 2: months later, it's gone three times multiplatinum in the US,

1914
01:41:44,600 --> 01:41:49,439
Speaker 2: which seems very low to me, honestly, but I guess yeah,

1915
01:41:49,520 --> 01:41:53,519
Speaker 2: man boy, rock music really died a hard death, didn't it.

1916
01:41:54,880 --> 01:41:58,559
Speaker 2: After four thirty years at the top, repeated out into

1917
01:41:58,560 --> 01:42:01,600
Speaker 2: the nineties. When it's like this foundational epical album that

1918
01:42:01,760 --> 01:42:04,479
Speaker 2: everyone loves, it is like sold three and a half

1919
01:42:04,640 --> 01:42:05,519
Speaker 2: million copies.

1920
01:42:05,880 --> 01:42:07,519
Speaker 1: I was gonna say that almost sounds high to me.

1921
01:42:07,840 --> 01:42:10,720
Speaker 2: Really, Yeah, all right, let's do some you know, how

1922
01:42:10,960 --> 01:42:13,120
Speaker 2: have you ever listened to this movie podcasts where people

1923
01:42:13,160 --> 01:42:16,960
Speaker 2: do like obscenely niche like box office analyzing.

1924
01:42:16,840 --> 01:42:19,559
Speaker 1: No but a funny feeling you're about to tell me no.

1925
01:42:19,720 --> 01:42:21,280
Speaker 2: I just I'm gonna do what they do and like

1926
01:42:21,439 --> 01:42:26,400
Speaker 2: look up, like you know what was big in nineteen

1927
01:42:26,439 --> 01:42:31,360
Speaker 2: ninety five as far as oh albums, what do you Got.

1928
01:42:33,640 --> 01:42:34,360
Speaker 1: Ninety five?

1929
01:42:34,760 --> 01:42:38,320
Speaker 3: That's a tough jack a little pills ninety five, I

1930
01:42:38,479 --> 01:42:38,960
Speaker 3: want to say.

1931
01:42:38,880 --> 01:42:43,160
Speaker 2: Well, the biggest, the biggest singles were Gangster's Paradise I.

1932
01:42:43,320 --> 01:42:45,120
Speaker 1: Was gonna say, I can see cooler.

1933
01:42:45,160 --> 01:42:50,200
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Shaggy's Bombastic, which was like number one everywhere

1934
01:42:50,280 --> 01:42:51,480
Speaker 2: except for the US.

1935
01:42:52,640 --> 01:42:54,440
Speaker 1: Me Against the World Tupac.

1936
01:42:54,479 --> 01:42:58,559
Speaker 2: Nope, Michael Jackson's You Are Not Alone Take that back

1937
01:42:58,680 --> 01:43:02,320
Speaker 2: for good. You two hold me, kiss Me, thrill.

1938
01:43:02,200 --> 01:43:05,560
Speaker 3: Me, oh HOODI, the Bullfish Crack Review I was just

1939
01:43:05,640 --> 01:43:06,720
Speaker 3: ninety four to ninety five.

1940
01:43:06,920 --> 01:43:09,360
Speaker 2: This is ninety five, but this is worldwide, so okay,

1941
01:43:09,439 --> 01:43:10,960
Speaker 2: so let's do top us albums.

1942
01:43:11,320 --> 01:43:14,960
Speaker 1: Cracked Rearview is probably one of the biggest. That's not

1943
01:43:15,040 --> 01:43:15,880
Speaker 1: the biggest of the year.

1944
01:43:16,080 --> 01:43:17,519
Speaker 2: Well, this is where you start to get into the

1945
01:43:17,640 --> 01:43:21,360
Speaker 2: commercial divide because the biggest, like critical hits were like

1946
01:43:21,479 --> 01:43:25,520
Speaker 2: The Bends by Radiohead, What's the Story, Morning Glory, Melancholy,

1947
01:43:25,680 --> 01:43:29,759
Speaker 2: and The Infinite Sadness, a pulp record called Different Class,

1948
01:43:29,840 --> 01:43:31,680
Speaker 2: which I Don't think is the one people remember now

1949
01:43:32,160 --> 01:43:36,639
Speaker 2: You're right about Jagged Little Pill b York Post Liquid

1950
01:43:36,720 --> 01:43:41,680
Speaker 2: Swords by Jizza Elliott Smith, self titled PJ. Harvey's To

1951
01:43:41,720 --> 01:43:44,160
Speaker 2: Bring You My Love, which again is not It's a

1952
01:43:44,200 --> 01:43:46,240
Speaker 2: great record, but I think more people talk about rid

1953
01:43:46,280 --> 01:43:48,920
Speaker 2: of Meat at this point from that era, and Pavement's

1954
01:43:49,040 --> 01:43:54,439
Speaker 2: Wowie Zowie interesting. So yeah not. Weezer didn't even scrape

1955
01:43:54,479 --> 01:44:01,120
Speaker 2: those levels. Highest selling albums US nineteen ninety five Cracked

1956
01:44:01,160 --> 01:44:05,120
Speaker 2: review by Hoodie Crazy Sexy Cool by TLC oh Yeah,

1957
01:44:05,760 --> 01:44:10,960
Speaker 2: Mariah Carey, Garth Brooks his greatest hits voice too, men,

1958
01:44:11,040 --> 01:44:14,120
Speaker 2: The Beatles Anthology Won Help Freeze is Over by the Eagles,

1959
01:44:14,520 --> 01:44:18,640
Speaker 2: Shania Twain, Woman and Me. You would never guess the

1960
01:44:18,760 --> 01:44:22,559
Speaker 2: last one, did you say, Mariah Carey? I did, Yeah,

1961
01:44:23,000 --> 01:44:25,760
Speaker 2: Daydream I'll give you a hint. The band is from

1962
01:44:25,760 --> 01:44:34,920
Speaker 2: Pennsylvania and these are opened for them on this same

1963
01:44:35,040 --> 01:44:36,519
Speaker 2: album tour of this album.

1964
01:44:36,320 --> 01:44:37,360
Speaker 1: I'm talking about.

1965
01:44:39,640 --> 01:44:45,519
Speaker 2: I Don't Know Live What Throwing Throwing Copper that was

1966
01:44:45,560 --> 01:44:47,720
Speaker 2: one of the best selling albums of nineteen ninety five.

1967
01:44:47,840 --> 01:44:53,160
Speaker 4: Oh My God, Knock and Feel It Come in Mac

1968
01:44:53,520 --> 01:44:58,360
Speaker 4: Again by Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads Pride of Lancaster, PA.

1969
01:44:58,600 --> 01:45:00,839
Speaker 1: That I didn't know anyway.

1970
01:45:02,080 --> 01:45:04,360
Speaker 2: Cuomo was reacting to this fame in his own way.

1971
01:45:04,560 --> 01:45:06,800
Speaker 2: By the end of the summer of nineteen ninety five,

1972
01:45:06,840 --> 01:45:09,120
Speaker 2: after year and a half on the road, he'd become

1973
01:45:09,200 --> 01:45:12,600
Speaker 2: burned out on music, period and decided to enroll at

1974
01:45:12,640 --> 01:45:15,640
Speaker 2: Harvard well rock music, i should say, because he was

1975
01:45:15,680 --> 01:45:18,880
Speaker 2: initially pursuing a classical music degree. He couldn't get into

1976
01:45:18,920 --> 01:45:26,400
Speaker 2: Juilliard though, and decided Harvard was his safety. But yeah,

1977
01:45:27,280 --> 01:45:30,120
Speaker 2: Brian Bell told Magnet, I remember the first time when

1978
01:45:30,160 --> 01:45:32,960
Speaker 2: we were on that tour, one of the first times

1979
01:45:33,000 --> 01:45:35,400
Speaker 2: we were on tour and we saw kids running towards us,

1980
01:45:35,439 --> 01:45:38,439
Speaker 2: and we were like, holy shit, run and Rivers said

1981
01:45:38,479 --> 01:45:44,040
Speaker 2: something like being famous sucks. He also underwent the complicated

1982
01:45:44,080 --> 01:45:47,800
Speaker 2: and invasive medical procedure to lengthen his lifetime shorter leg,

1983
01:45:47,840 --> 01:45:51,800
Speaker 2: which involved breaking his femur in half to extend it,

1984
01:45:52,360 --> 01:45:55,280
Speaker 2: so he was like consigned to bed, a bunch of

1985
01:45:55,720 --> 01:45:58,599
Speaker 2: horrifying physical therapy. He had to walk with a cane,

1986
01:45:59,640 --> 01:46:03,519
Speaker 2: and he had all the anonymity he wished his freshman

1987
01:46:03,600 --> 01:46:06,559
Speaker 2: year at Harvard, where he disappeared into classes and then

1988
01:46:06,640 --> 01:46:08,760
Speaker 2: by his own admission. About two to three weeks into

1989
01:46:08,800 --> 01:46:10,880
Speaker 2: his first semester, he thought, I kind of want to

1990
01:46:10,920 --> 01:46:12,559
Speaker 2: go back to being in a band, and he did

1991
01:46:12,600 --> 01:46:15,759
Speaker 2: eventually graduate from Harvard. Also, while on Torres, we mentioned earlier,

1992
01:46:15,760 --> 01:46:18,120
Speaker 2: Croomo had become obsessed with musicals and planned for the

1993
01:46:18,160 --> 01:46:20,599
Speaker 2: follow up to Blue album to become this rock opera,

1994
01:46:21,840 --> 01:46:24,880
Speaker 2: but then pivoted all of that energy into Pinkerton. He

1995
01:46:24,880 --> 01:46:26,559
Speaker 2: said in two thousand and seven, I think the whole

1996
01:46:26,720 --> 01:46:28,680
Speaker 2: songs from the black Hole thing has gotten way out

1997
01:46:28,680 --> 01:46:30,960
Speaker 2: of proportion in people's minds. It was just like a

1998
01:46:31,080 --> 01:46:33,160
Speaker 2: third of an album that was sketched out, and most

1999
01:46:33,200 --> 01:46:35,840
Speaker 2: of these songs on it weren't really written specifically for it.

2000
01:46:36,200 --> 01:46:38,320
Speaker 2: They were written before I conceived of the concept, and

2001
01:46:38,360 --> 01:46:40,160
Speaker 2: then I reshaped them a little bit for black Hole.

2002
01:46:40,560 --> 01:46:43,479
Speaker 2: After I abandoned that idea, I unshaped them and put

2003
01:46:43,520 --> 01:46:47,280
Speaker 2: them on Pinkerton. Pinkerton, of course, in Weezer and twenty

2004
01:46:47,320 --> 01:46:49,920
Speaker 2: century music stuff period, is like one of the great

2005
01:46:50,000 --> 01:46:53,840
Speaker 2: misunderstood sophomore records. They produced it themselves. It was really

2006
01:46:54,000 --> 01:46:55,800
Speaker 2: raw and as we mentioned earlier, had a bunch of

2007
01:46:56,000 --> 01:46:59,719
Speaker 2: weird stuff about sex on it, and it has become

2008
01:47:00,880 --> 01:47:05,479
Speaker 2: did as this, like I don't know proto emo. It

2009
01:47:05,640 --> 01:47:07,599
Speaker 2: gets really weird because then you have to think about

2010
01:47:07,640 --> 01:47:10,599
Speaker 2: his emo going back to the Washington DC era kind

2011
01:47:10,640 --> 01:47:13,320
Speaker 2: of discord days. But you also think about emo as

2012
01:47:13,360 --> 01:47:16,519
Speaker 2: this thing that pop emo kind of reached critical mass

2013
01:47:16,600 --> 01:47:18,600
Speaker 2: in like that late nineties and early two thousands. And

2014
01:47:19,720 --> 01:47:23,719
Speaker 2: I bore myself when I start talking like this, so well, stop,

2015
01:47:24,560 --> 01:47:26,840
Speaker 2: that's all a story for a different time. I found

2016
01:47:26,880 --> 01:47:29,680
Speaker 2: a wonderful quote from Rivers to end this episode on,

2017
01:47:30,680 --> 01:47:33,080
Speaker 2: and I will do that now. He actually has said

2018
01:47:33,120 --> 01:47:35,960
Speaker 2: this to his own biographer about the Blue album. None

2019
01:47:36,000 --> 01:47:38,160
Speaker 2: of these songs are perfect, but I think you can

2020
01:47:38,240 --> 01:47:40,760
Speaker 2: hear that we're trying hard to be honest and real.

2021
01:47:41,560 --> 01:47:44,040
Speaker 2: The record sounds kind of weird, but if you turn

2022
01:47:44,120 --> 01:47:47,839
Speaker 2: it up extremely loud and lie down, it can be rewarding.

2023
01:47:49,880 --> 01:47:54,320
Speaker 2: What a beautiful summation of everything. We've spent three hours

2024
01:47:54,360 --> 01:47:56,280
Speaker 2: talking about two and a half hours. Two and a

2025
01:47:56,280 --> 01:47:56,720
Speaker 2: half hours.

2026
01:47:56,760 --> 01:47:58,360
Speaker 1: That's why I hope people listen to our show.

2027
01:47:59,080 --> 01:48:00,840
Speaker 2: True, I don't know if you need to hear me

2028
01:48:00,960 --> 01:48:04,839
Speaker 2: really loud. We're both already kind of loud, but definitely

2029
01:48:04,960 --> 01:48:05,400
Speaker 2: lie down.

2030
01:48:05,840 --> 01:48:06,040
Speaker 3: Yeah.

2031
01:48:08,840 --> 01:48:10,880
Speaker 2: Anyway, thank you for listening. Folks, this has been too

2032
01:48:10,960 --> 01:48:15,160
Speaker 2: much information. We didn't do any impressions or bits on

2033
01:48:15,280 --> 01:48:15,959
Speaker 2: this episode.

2034
01:48:16,320 --> 01:48:17,360
Speaker 1: Can you do rivers?

2035
01:48:17,880 --> 01:48:17,920
Speaker 3: No.

2036
01:48:18,439 --> 01:48:20,880
Speaker 2: The other funniest thing about when they were recording all

2037
01:48:20,880 --> 01:48:23,040
Speaker 2: this stuff with him being like, oh, I don't have

2038
01:48:23,160 --> 01:48:24,920
Speaker 2: to sing like a heavy metal guy, Like I could

2039
01:48:25,000 --> 01:48:27,800
Speaker 2: just use my normal voice. Like I think he just

2040
01:48:27,880 --> 01:48:29,720
Speaker 2: did not have the conception of being like a front

2041
01:48:29,800 --> 01:48:31,880
Speaker 2: man where you could just have a normal voice. Yeah,

2042
01:48:33,360 --> 01:48:36,200
Speaker 2: so funny. Thank you for listening. This has been too

2043
01:48:36,280 --> 01:48:39,200
Speaker 2: much information. And I am Alex Heigel.

2044
01:48:39,360 --> 01:48:42,200
Speaker 1: And I'm Jordan run Tag. We'll catch you next time.

2045
01:48:47,400 --> 01:48:50,519
Speaker 1: Too Much Information was a production of iHeartRadio. The show's

2046
01:48:50,560 --> 01:48:53,360
Speaker 1: executive producers are Noel Brown and Jordan run Talk.

2047
01:48:53,560 --> 01:48:56,360
Speaker 3: The show's supervising producer is Michael Alder June.

2048
01:48:56,640 --> 01:48:59,160
Speaker 1: The show was researched, written, and hosted.

2049
01:48:58,840 --> 01:49:00,920
Speaker 2: By Jordan run Talk and Alex Heigel.

2050
01:49:00,760 --> 01:49:03,920
Speaker 1: With original music by Seth Applebaum and the Ghost Funk Orchestra.

2051
01:49:04,320 --> 01:49:06,360
Speaker 1: If you like what you heard, please subscribe and leave

2052
01:49:06,400 --> 01:49:06,880
Speaker 1: us a review.

2053
01:49:07,160 --> 01:49:11,440
Speaker 3: For more podcasts and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

2054
01:49:11,720 --> 01:49:13,439
Speaker 3: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.