Weezer Going Back to the Good Life
A hat tip to Pause & Play for posting the Amazon pre-order link for a Deluxe Edition of Pinkerton, the sophomore LP by alt-rock stalwarts Weezer, coming from Geffen and UMe.
When it was released in 1996, Pinkerton was ill-received by critics and fans expecting a traditional follow-up to the band’s excellent self-titled debut, which featured hooky garage-pop with Ric Ocasek of The Cars in the producer’s chair. By contrast, Pinkerton – initially conceived as a space-rock opera called Songs from the Black Hole and recorded between breaks in lead singer Rivers Cuomo’s first year at Harvard – was a darker affair with a less radio-friendly sound and an almost disturbing amount of lyrical introspection. Of course, since then, those flaws have been seen as high points (especially in the wake of the emo subgenre), and many of those same critics now consider Pinkerton a classic.
There’s no firm word on the material that will be added to this deluxe reissue – at least eight B-sides, live cuts and remixes were included on CD singles at the time, and many of those Black Hole demos were released on two demo compilations Cuomo oversaw some years ago – but hopefully the set will be as satisfying as Geffen’s reissue of Weezer’s first record was back in 2004. And The Second Disc will surely have a lot more to report before the expected release date of October 5.
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2 thoughts on “Weezer Going Back to the Good Life”
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Can someone please explain to me what is so special about this album that I’m not hearing?
People have waxed poetic about it since a couple years past its original release, and I just don’t get it.
Personally, I’ll take the Green album and Maladroit over Pinkerton any day. Those two have everything I love about Weezer: hooks, riffs and fun.
Pinkerton represents an anomaly in their catalog, IMO.
I’ll be honest, I actually feel the same way. Maybe it doesn’t make me a “real” Weezer fan (whatever that means) but The Blue Album was and is my all-time favorite of theirs, and I’ve got nothing against their out-and-out pop from the past decade (although I was largely unimpressed with The Red Album).
That said, I’ll probably pick this one up, since Weezer is one of those bands for meticulous people, a quality that usually translates to well-executed reissues.