CD review: Raditude - Weezer
By CHRIS SCHULZ - Stuff.co.nz
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You've heard Weezer duet with infamous YouTube stars. You've seen them perform at Hugh Hefner's Playboy Mansion surrounded by blonde bunnies.
And you've scratched your head at the mind-warping eight-part harmonies of The Greatest Man That Ever Lived - the brilliantly bonkers track from last year's The Red Album.
But have you heard Weezer do Bollywood? After listening to Raditude's ill-advised ballad Love Is the Answer - complete with sitar and vocals by Indian singers Amrita Sen and Nishat Khan - you'd might rather wish you hadn't.
It's not the only misfire on Weezer's seventh album. For the first time, Rivers Cuomo and co have tried to create an entire album of simple pop-rock songs, in the mould of previous album singles Beverly Hills and Pork and Beans.
At times, it works. The jangly pop of I Want You To and the crunchy riffs and "woh-oh-ohs" of The Girl Got Hot contain choruses that will swirl around your head for days, while the synth-ridden club anthem Can't Stop Partying - complete with a cameo by frazzled rapper Lil Wayne - is dryly ironic.
But that irony - something Weezer normally do so well - goes missing on the rest of the album. In the Mall is as bland as the title suggests, while Put Me Back Together and I Don't Want To Let You Go are Grey's Anatomy cheesefests that should have been made by a band half Weezer's age.
And when, on the decidedly dodgy I'm Your Daddy, Cuomo starts singing the chrous, "You are my baby tonight, and I'm your daddy," you have to start questioning the 39-year-old's motives.
It's been a long time since Weezer have made a concise full-lengh album. For that you'd have to go back to 1996's Pinkerton, and that's where fans should head if they want to hear an album that's definitely radder than Raditude.
* What do you think of Raditude? Post your comments below.
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"Simple Pages" (Green album) is my fave Weezer song across the catalogue.
pretty bad album, hard to imagine any real motive behind it other than getting better sales, at any cost. But that across the sea song was beautiful.. nothing seedy in it.
Though not as good as Pinkerton (lets face it, they will never put out anything as good as that again), Raditude has got plenty of great Weezer pop/rock hooks. Agree, love is the answer is awful though! Weezer need to pay NZ a visit again.
Def agree that Pinkerton is the pick of the bunch. In regards Rivers' motives, he has always been a touch on the dodgy side, Across the Sea is a great song while also a love letter to an underage Japanese schoolgirl fan - "I could never touch you, I think it would be wrong, I got your letter, you got my song"
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Raditude is a great album people. Stop using the blue album and Pinkerton as a bench mark. Yes they are the best albums but probably will never be repeated. Just enjoy Weezer for what they are. Go Rivers and co!