Pig

From Weezerpedia
"Pig"
Pig cover
Album track by Weezer
Album Weezer (The Red Album) (Deluxe Edition)
Released June 11, 2008
Recorded July-October 2007
Length 4:02
Label Geffen
Writer(s) Rivers Cuomo
Producer(s) Weezer
Status Officially released
Live debut May 9, 2018 in San Francisco, CA (Cuomo-only)
Stream Spotify
Apple Music
Weezer (The Red Album) (Deluxe Edition) track listing
14 tracks
  1. "Troublemaker"
  2. "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived"
  3. "Pork and Beans"
  4. "Heart Songs"
  5. "Everybody Get Dangerous"
  6. "Dreamin'"
  7. "Thought I Knew"
  8. "Cold Dark World"
  9. "Automatic"
  10. "The Angel and the One"
Deluxe Editon bonus tracks
  2. "Miss Sweeney"
  3. "Pig"
  4. "The Spider"
  5. "King"
Deliverance at Hand! track listing
18 tracks
  1. "Autopilot"
  2. "Heart Songs"
  3. "Here Comes the Girl"
  4. "I Don't Wanna Let You Go"
  5. "King"
  6. "Everybody Get Dangerous"
  7. "Leader of the Pack"
  8. "Miss Sweeney"
  9. "My Bark Is Worse Than My Bite"
  10. "My Day Is Coming"
  11. "Piece of the Pie"
  12. "Pig"
  13. "Respect"
  14. "Run Over by a Truck"
  15. "Why Can't You Shut Your Mouth?"
  16. "The Odd Couple"
  17. "These Things That You Do"
  18. "The Angel and the One"

"Pig" is the twelfth track on the deluxe edition of The Red Album.

Appearances

Overview

The Harvard Crimson: What are some of the topics that you’re writing about now?

Rivers: I’m working on a song called “Pig,” which, ah, follows the life of a pig, from when it’s just a little piglet on the farm, playing with other animals, to a point where it’s grown up and married and has kids, but then it eventually [laughs], it gets slaughtered!

—Interview with The Harvard Crimson, 2006[1]

"Pig" is first known to have been demoed in 2006. Like other songs written during the era (such as "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived), "Pig" eschews the band's typical verse-chorus structure. Though Cuomo has not commented on the song's inspiration, Cuomo (a lifelong vegetarian) mentioned in a June 2006 interview that he was struck by the cruelty of the eponymous character in the novel Robinson Crusoe. "Like there's so little feeling of compassion or regret that he has to kill the animals to survive. I'm not sure what to make of it yet. The way he describes it is so cold[...] It never occurred to him that the suffering of the animals is something to worry about or to feel sorry about[...] Maybe there's something in me that's reacting to this and that maybe other people wouldn't notice it."[2] The track that follows "Pig" on The Red Album, "The Spider," similarly conveys a empathy for animals, through the metaphor of a dying spider in a drain.

Cuomo first mentioned the existence of "Pig" in an interview with The Harvard Crimson in April of 2006.[1] A year later, in April of 2007, Cuomo's acoustic demo was anonymously leaked by Cuomo to music blogs,[3] the first new song by Cuomo heard by fans since the release of Weezer's Make Believe in 2005. The demo's MP3 metadata indicated that the song was the twelfth track on an 18-track demo titled Deliverance at Hand!, which fans would later discover was a collection of Cuomo's demos in contention for Weezer's planned sixth album.

Prior to the release of The Red Album, Cuomo teased on Myspace that the album's debut single would be about a "four-legged pink farm animal," likely a deliberate misdirect to lead fans to believe the song would be "Pig," instead of the actual single, "Pork and Beans." A full-band recording of "Pig" was ultimately released as a bonus track on Red's deluxe version. The studio version of the song forgoes the demo's use of harmonica in favor of synthesized strings. This version also adds sound effects for the "whiplash sound" and claps mentioned in the lyrics.

At least three of the babies named in the song (Gina, Shannon, Gabe) share names with Cuomo's half-siblings (Gina Cuomo and Gabe Cuomo) and step-brother (Shannon Cuomo).


Personnel

Audio

Lyrics

  • Red lyric sheet.

    Red lyric sheet.

  • Lyric sheet from the Deliverance at Hand! booklet.

    Lyric sheet from the Deliverance at Hand! booklet.

  • Lyric sheet from the Deliverance at Hand! booklet.

    Lyric sheet from the Deliverance at Hand! booklet.

When I was a baby I was so happy.
I played with my friends in the mud.
Wilbur and Jack and Otis and Beatty,
We were a gang, you gotta believe me.
Momma would scold us if we got too rough
She didn't care, she was proud of us.
I ran around and talked to the animals,
Tellin' 'em stories of savage cannibals.

Then I got older and noticed a girl.
At first I was sure I didn't exist to her.
I sulked around but I didn't know why.
Then she put her cheek on my shoulder and I
Was lookin' at her and she was lookin' at me.
We started to smile - it was our destiny.
Tina was her name, she was my cutie-pie.
I forgot about the things that I used to like.

I spent all my time followin' her around.
My friends all made the whip-lash sound.
But they understood, they was happy for me
And everyone clapped when I asked her to marry me
And she said "yes" and we felt so fine.
We lost track of the passin' of time.
Before I knew it, we had our own babies:
Gina and Shannon and Keebie and Gabe

But now I've got to die.
I've lived a good life - I've got no complaints.
I'd like to thank farmer Pete
For bringing me scraps of food that I could eat.
He always had a smile on his face.
He didn't want to think of this day.
It's finally here.
It's finally here, oh.

Oo-oo, they called me Pig.
Oo-oo, they called me Pig.

When I was a baby I was so happy.
I played with my friends in the mud.

Known recordings

Performer(s) Title Filename Date of recording Recording location Length Appeared on Notes
Rivers Cuomo Pig Pig.mp3 2006 3:28 Alone X: The Red-Raditude-Hurley Years
Rivers Cuomo Pig 12 Pig.mp3 2006—2007
Rivers Cuomo Pig 12 Pig 2.mp3 2007 3:36 Deliverance at Hand! demo
Weezer Pig 2007
  • Shangri La Studios, Malibu, CA
  • Malibu Performing Arts Center, Malibu, CA
  • Threshold Studios, Santa Monica, CA
 4:02 Weezer (The Red Album) (Deluxe)
about this table

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Riesman, Abe J. "Rivers' End: Weezer’s frontman speaks out on women, Expos, what he’s writing now, and his marriage to a Japanese girl" The Harvard Crimson. 26 April 2006. https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2006/4/26/rivers-end-in-early-1995-a/
  2. ↑ "Alt Rocker Finds Inner Peace" Beliefnet. June 2006. https://www.beliefnet.com/entertainment/music/2006/06/alt-rocker-finds-inner-peace.aspx
  3. ↑ Raftery, Brian. "Leak Of The Day: Rivers Cuomo Takes A Trip To The Animal Farm" Idolator. 9 April 2007. https://www.idolator.com/250650/leak-of-the-day-rivers-cuomo-takes-a-trip-to-the-animal-farm

External links

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