Weezer

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WEEZER

Formed: 1992, Los Angeles, California

Members: Brian Bell, guitar, vocals (born Knoxville, Tennessee, 9 December 1968); Rivers Cuomo, vocals, guitar (born Yogaville, Connecticut, 13 June 1970); Scott Shriner, bass, vocals (born Toledo, Ohio, 11 July 1971); Patrick Wilson, drums (born Buffalo, New York, 1 February 1969). Former members: Jason Cropper, guitar, vocals (born Oakland, California, 1970); Matt Sharp, bass, vocals (born Arlington, Virginia, 20 September 1969); Mikey Welsh, bass, vocals (born Syracuse, New York, 20 April 1971).

Genre: Rock

Best-selling album since 1990: Weezer (1994)

Hit songs since 1990: "Buddy Holly," "Undone—The Sweater Song," "Hash Pipe"

Seldom has a rock band made as much of a virtue of being uncool as Weezer has. Unabashedly uncool, the quartet, led by enigmatic, bespectacled singer/guitarist Rivers Cuomo, not only revel in their awkwardness, but also sell millions of albums with cheerful, hook-heavy power pop anthems such as "Hash Pipe" and "Dope Nose," with sometimes dark, risqué lyrics. Despite an unhip look and a retro 1970s sound that was stridently out of step with the hard rock and fluffy teen pop of the decade, Weezer became huge alternative radio stars and built a cult audience that hung on Cuomo's every word.

Weezer was formed in early 1992 in Los Angeles by Connecticut-raised Cuomo, a former member of several high school heavy metal bands, guitarist Jason Cropper, drummer Pat Wilson, and bassist Matt Sharp. After sixteen months of playing local clubs, the group drew the attention of Geffen Records, which signed them and packed the group off to New York to record their debut with former Cars singer Ric Ocasek. Cropper split with the group halfway into the recording of Weezer (1994) and was replaced by Carnival Art guitarist Brian Bell.

Released in May 1994, during the height of the noisy, bleak grunge rock period, Weezer yielded an immediate hit song in the oddball pop track "Undone—The Sweater Song." Over a lazily strummed guitar and lethargic drums, a pair of friends discuss their plans for the night before Cuomo's strident, deadpan vocals break in with the oblique chorus, "If you want to destroy my sweater / Hold this thread as I walk away / Watch me unravel, I'll soon be naked."

With short two- and three-minute songs, Weezer opts for economy over showy virtuosity, with few guitar solos, pleasant three-part harmonies, and joyous power pop guitar chords, sometimes mixed with the arena bombast of 1970s makeup rockers KISS. On the hit "Buddy Holly," a wistful new wave rocker that mixes the mindless, cheerful choruses of 1950s and 1960s pop with 1990s hip-hop slang and vintage early 1980s synthesizers, Weezer creates a template for its success: knowingly uncool music delivered with a smart, winking postmodern irony. The album's sales were boosted by equally ironic, arty videos, especially for "Buddy Holly," in which acclaimed film director Spike Jonze fused the group into the set of the popular 1970s sitcom Happy Days.

The album sold more than 2 million copies, but was followed by a period of inactivity. The unpredictable Cuomo enrolled in Harvard University, Sharp and Wilson worked on the debut from their side band, the Rentals, and Bell recorded an album with his side project, the Space Twins. When Weezer emerged with the dark, self-produced Pinkerton in September 1996, fans were taken aback.

Pinkerton Almost Destroys Band on Way to Cult Classic Status

With crunchier, angrier guitars, keening keyboards, and at times yelping, screaming vocals, Pinkerton songs such as "Tired of Sex" and "Getchoo" reek of desperation and depression. Cuomo verily spits his lyrics above the cheerless din of slashing guitars, singing songs about heartbreak in which the veil of irony is pulled back to reveal someone who has clearly undergone an emotional trauma. Though he had been the main songwriting force in the band since its inception, the album marks the point at which Cuomo became the primary musical force in the group as well.

Even on songs such as the surfy punk track "Why Bother?," which retains the band's signature three-part harmonies and pop choruses, the pain is palpable ("Why bother, it's gonna hurt me / It's gonna kill when you desert me"). While it sold respectably over time, the album was not as commercially successful as its predecessor and was later repudiated by Cuomo, who said it was too revealing and embarrassing.

Though, for the most part, Cuomo shunned playing the album's songs and seemed uncomfortable even discussing it, Pinkerton became something of a cult classic, helping to launch a whole generation of late 1990s bands such as Dashboard Confessional and Saves the Day. Those groups were tagged as "emo," short for emotional, and were notable for their naked honesty and pop punk sensibility. Sharp left the group following the album's release to concentrate on the Rentals and was replaced by former Juliana Hatfield band bassist Mikey Welsh.

A long period of inactivity followed, with Rivers returning to Harvard and playing a series of solo shows in Boston with Welsh during 1998, Bell releasing a Space Twins album, and Wilson and Welsh touring with the Special Goodness. Despite meeting up several times in Los Angeles in 1998 to attempt recording sessions, Cuomo's heart was clearly not in it. The singer again drew into his shell, painting the walls and ceiling of a rented Los Angeles apartment black, disconnecting the phone, and shunning all human contact for months at a time.

To their shock, when Weezer began a series of shows under assumed names in the spring of 2000 and later booked themselves onto the punk/skate multi-act Warped Tour festival and into some clubs, the response was rabid . . . and the fans were young. The club tour was a sell-out and was followed by another sold-out tour of larger venues, many of them filled with teens who had discovered the group in the post-Pinkerton period.

The band reunited with Ocasek to record their second self-titled album (known as the "green album" due to its cover's color) in late 2000. It yielded a huge alternative radio hit with a bizarre story of a drug-smoking homosexual male transvestite prostitute, "Hash Pipe," notable for its churning, crime-jazz guitar riff and Cuomo's keening falsetto singing. After eschewing comical, flashy videos for their last album, the band returned with another classic clip for the song, this time featuring corpulent sumo wrestlers butting heads.

Despite having written more than 100 new songs, the brief (twenty-eight-minute) ten-track album is a triumph of pop smarts and economy, returning to the bright ("Don't Let Go"), hand-clapping ("Photograph"), poppy sound of the band's debut. During a summer 2001 tour, Welsh checked himself into a mental hospital and was permanently replaced by former Broken bassist Scott Shriner.

After posting dozens of in-process tracks on their website, the group quickly recorded another album, the self-produced Maladroit (2002). In an unpredictable career, it was yet another left turn, as it, seemingly without irony, slathers their pop hooks with bombastic guitar solos and chunky riffs that pay homage to the flashy heavy metal bands of the mid-1970s and late 1980s.

Weezer proved that the cool kids do not always get all the breaks. With a genius facility for pop hooks, a twisted imagination, and a career plan only he could understand, Cuomo wrote some of the most indelible pop hits of the 1990s. Along the way, he inspired a whole generation of emo rockers (Dashboard Confessional, Saves the Day, New Found Glory) to put their hearts on their punkpop sleeves.