Karl's Corner - 04/30/2002

04/30/02 tomorrow never comes until its too late

update 5/01: see the 4/26 vancouver report for additional pix

...Dusty West Tour: Travel/Day Off

just a day to chill in Billings, Montana... and catch up on some work! But also there was a bit of recreation. Hit the only mall in town today with Mr Wilson, who ended up being asked for about 40 autographs as we strolled around looking at things that should not be bought. Purchases were made at Electronics Boutique, however, as the lure of the computer game was strong...

...On Thursday, May 2, at noon, the message boards will be down for approximately 2 to 4 hours. They should then return with some added features. Thanks for your patience!

...some Mtv viewers have written in, having spotted a new tv ad for "Maladroit", which incorporates some footage from the new 'Dope Nose' video. The commercial got played during that wacky real life show, "The Osbournes".

...Important show confirmation: Weezer has been officially confirmed to play this summer's UK Reading Festival! Weezer will be playing the first day, August 23rd, alongside such bands as The Strokes, Janes Addiction, and Pulp. Some UK fans recently spotted the poster for the festival and wrote in, concerned about a repeat of what happened last year (where the weez was put on the poster line-up without having been asked if they could play). But this time, its all good! See you in Reading! (tickets can be ordered online at meanfiddler.com or Ticketmaster UK.

...Here are dates for some upcoming Bay Area Maladroit listening parties. These are the things where they blast the new album, theres some free food and whatnot, and free weezer stuff is given out. Friday, May 3rd - The Cat Club (Fake) 9pm-10pm - 1190 Folsom (between 7th & 8th) San Francisco Tuesday, May 7th - Rasputin Music - 4pm - 2401 Telegraph Avenue, Berkley

...The May issue of Q magazine includes one of the first magazine reviews of the forthcoming "Maladroit" album:

"In the parlance of American talk-show hosts, Weezer's Rivers Cuomo "had issues". The trick is that this lapsed Harvard student masks his emotional trauma inside a big, billowy rock'n'roll songs: an art that helped sell several million copies of the US quartet's 94 debut.Maladroit, their fourth, follows 2001's The Green Album in under 12 months, confirming the theory that Cuomo has stockpiled songs like an arms-hoarding Unbomber brooding in hs stockade. Their creator's disaffection gnaws away on many of the 13 here: a buzz for die-hard followers, less so for those looking for one-dimensional punk thrills. Guitars bleat on Take Contol, and Cuomo's demands to "Leave Me Alone" dominate Slob .

Amid all the bitching and moaning, though, are some of their finest songs of Weezer's career: the fizzy Banana Splits-style Dope Nose, Love Explosion's toppling house-of-cards guitars. Here, Weezer fashion three-minute calling cards to thaw the coldest of hearts "Love barely alive", gasps silly old Rivers on Slave, reminding the world that however sunny his choruses he's still hurting. Sadly, if he found whatever it is he's looking for, Weezer would struggle to make records as good as this." (4/5 stars)

...and here's a review of the Vancouver show, from Monday's Vancouver Sun...

"The Spectacle is aural when Weezer Rocks

by Kerry Gold

WEEZER

Pacific Coliseum, Friday

It's been awhile since the floors vibrated with the bounce of a thousand fans moshing and crowd surfing. But nerd rockers Weezer supplied a long overdue rock 'n' roll feast Friday night at the Pacific Coliseum.

The Los Angeles band didn't exactly deliver a spectacle - the stage show, featuring a somewhat austere backdrop of a metallic checkerboard, coloured lighting and dry ice, hardly registering as high impact in the visual stimulation department.

And Weezer, fronted by the eccentric and grizzly looking Rivers Cuomo (sporting dark-framed glasses and unkempt beard), didn't say much to their enthusiastic fans. But in the minimalist terms on an entirely music-driven concert, you couldn't expect much more than 90 minutes of wiry, rocking guitar and accompanying solos, the band's stash of melodic power pop gems and tight, infectious sound.

The ironic but heartfelt lyrics combined with the layers of guitars and harmony and occasional grins from the usually reserved band members, generated an atmosphere of something spectacular without the spectacle. The band, including drummer Patrick Wilson, guitarist Brian Bell, and new bassist Scott Shriner (who replaced Mikey Welsh), knew they'd done good. Cuomo himself shouted at one point: "Superlative job, boys. That's A+ work."

Weezer kept the momentum high with favourites such as Undone and Island in the Sun, and they opened up the throttle on infectious, guitar-pummelling numbers The Good Life and Surf Wax America. Fans in the audience pogoed as if to save their lives, and the glee wasn't reserved for more mainstream hits Buddy Holly and Hash Pipe, either. More than 4,000 fans (not quite sold out) in the concert bowl were of the diehard variety that know the words to every song - such is the cultish appeal of a band that has the art-house sense to marry Pixies hyperactivity with Beach Boys' melodic lushness.

A few clever, unexpected mid-song tempo changes fuelled the off-beat atmosphere. And during one segment, the lights went low, the stage was enveloped in a blue fog, and the show slipped into neutral, as if taking a giant breather for the next power pop onslaught. Weezer couldn't have planned it any better - like Cuomo himself said, superlative."

...Okay, the 7th annual Air Guitar World Championships are coming up in Finland again this summer. Now, last years competition was won by a guy (Zac Monro, of London) air-guitaring to "Hash Pipe"! And apparently he's determined to be the first 2 time winner...who knows what song he'll use? Here's the website,in case you want to sign up to compete!

...High School Madness! (and other madness)

"...in my geology class here at the university of kansas, we were told that we would be watching a video on "the death and destruction of rivers..." i then giggled. ---?

"...Just letting you know that my green album cd was stolen. My mate was held up at gun point and they stole his cds and my green album cd was in his cd wallet because I had been playing it in his car. They could've had any of my other cds but not my weezer cd. I'm so annoyed..." ---Lachlan

"...We had to do an assignment about any event in world history, and some people did timelines, drew abstract pictures, and the other "standards". us, we had other ideas. after much consideration about which song to "parody" (or maybe more like "pay homage to"), we found that 'Buddy Holly' fit perfectly for our theme of the stock market crash of 1929 and the Great Depression (not that BH is depressing or anything, of course =) so we got a buncha lyrics together on the last night before the due date, and we presented 'Takin' It Back to '29', to the tune of 'Buddy Holly' by Weezer, to our Grade 12 French immersion world history class (even though the lyrics were in English). one excerpt includes (being the prechorus)
"oo oo, and they know I'm poor
oo oo, they take all that's mine
oo oo, and it's 1929"
and others i can't recall at this time, but some having to do with then-President Herbert Hoover ("whatsa matta, whatsa matta, whatsa matta Hoov") and such. we got a mark of 100% and it showed in the appreciation of both the teacher and our classmates (most of whom recognized the song, of course), since we even brought our own instruments in (me an electric guitar, my friend a bass)." ---Chuck, St. John's, Newfoundland, Canada

"...Two nights ago I was at the MTV Campus Invasion Tour because it came to my school and I figure why not check the show out. Well the openers Injected really rocked, but they got almost no crowd support because everyone showed up because it was MTV, not because it was a rock concert. Wel they had a meet and greet thing after their set and I went out to talk to them and one of them asked what my name was. "Well, my name is Jonas" is what I tell 'em cuz it is and almost imediately one of the guys from Injected breaks out into Weezer's My Name is Jonas. That made the night... I went back out to watch the rest of the show with default and nickleback, both bands were really good but the crowds just aren't anything near what I've gotten used to after my last few Weez shows..." ---Jonas

"...My friend was listening to the blue album in calculus class and was listening to it quite loudly. The rest of the class was completely quiet, working on questions and what not, so the weez could be heard clearly. The teacher got up and told my friend to "get out of his garage and get back to derivates." Calculus always seems better when there is an obscure weezer reference thrown into the mix..." ---Mike

"I wore my recently purchased "If it's too loud" shirt to school the other day, and in my lunch period, I had gotten my lunch and as I was walking back to my table, one of former members of my band blurted out "WEEZER SUCKS YOU F******* POSER!!!". All I did was laugh at him and continue walking. hehe. Now I love =W= even more..." ---?

"...I just returned from our high school prom. I am the class president of the junior class so I get to make a lot of the decisions for the senior prom. My friend (vice-president) and I decided to try to make it a Weezer prom. So, when we nominated the four prom themes for the class to vote on, we had "Island in the Sun" as one of them, and the other three were [terrible] themes so that the class would have no choice but to pick "Island in the Sun". Prom night came around, and after I announced the king and queen and they had their dance, the DJ played "Island in the Sun". It was awesome because everyone was dancing and then "Island in the Sun" came on and everyone stopped . . . it's not the easiest song to dance to. The DJ was cool as hell, he played the whole Green Album and "Dope Nose". " ---Jeff

"...believe it - my school had "only in dreams" as our prom theme this year. here's some proof in picture form..." ---katy

"...i was in english class the other day,(does everything happen in english classes??)and i hear my friend calling my name so i look across the room. we were taking a test, but the both of us had finished and she gives me the weezer sign, but she does it wrong. so i am sitting on the opposite side of the room, it being completly silent, and trying to teach her how to do the =w= sign. all of the sudden, this blink 182 fanatic looks up and just says, "weezer, my god people, get a life. geeks!" i lost it, and she said it really loud too. and then, my teacher starts laughing, "weezer, is that really their name. how funny, i have never heard of them."" ---"biggest weezer fan in illinois"

"...i was just reading the school newspaper and there's an article in it about some a cappella event that took place this past weekend. some group actually performed some weezer songs! "The N’Harmonics were then introduced, and the official Tisch School of the Arts a cappella group treated the audience to selections from Earth Wind and Fire, the Rocky Horror Picture Show, Björk, WEEZER and Aretha Franklin... a cultural cross-section of musical genius."" ---dennis ,nyc

"...in our spanish class, we've been having various subs for quite a while and none of them know what's going on with our assignments. so, one asked about these two packets we had been given. so my classmate (with whom i have a =w= bond) says, "ok, on the first packet, most people are like 1/2 done, a few are all done. but the second packet is completely undone......like my sweater." i got the joke and started laughing. he gave me a little nod, and we had this =w= moment. then the teacher goes "yes, yes a weezer reference." i was so impressed that he actually got it! it's so weird to imagine a teacher knowing weezer.....being human...." ---elizabeth