Weezer (retrospectively known as The Red Album to separate it from the other band's self-titled releases) is the sixth studio album by Weezer, released in 2008.
It followed another hiatus for the band, as Cuomo went back to Harvard to finish his degree and marry his now-wife, Kyoto Ito. Meanwhile, the rest of the band pursued side projects; Patrick Wilson and Brian Bell appeared in the 2006 film Factory Girl, while Brian formed another band called The Relationship (though unlike with ex-bassist Matt Sharp's band The Rentals, this would not lead to Brian departing from Weezer).
The band reconvened in 2007 to begin work on what would become The Red Album. Production duties were split three-way between Make Believe producer Rick Rubin, Jacknife Lee, and Weezer themselves. It is noted for being more experimental than the other albums, with Cuomo allowing his bandmates to contribute songwriting to the album (the first time since Weezer (The Blue Album)) and even sing lead on some tracks (a first for any Weezer album). It contains songs that deviate from the "verse-chorus—verse-chorus-bridge" structure, like "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)", "Dreamin'", and "The Angel and the One".
Four singles were released, including the aforementioned "The Greatest Man that Ever Lived" and "Dreamin'", as well as "Pork and Beans" and "Troublemaker", the latter having an iTunes cover illustrated by mangaka Manabu Akishige (who wrote and illustrated the manga Go-On!). "Pork and Beans" is notable for having a music video which featured many of the famous internet meme stars of the day, including Tay Zonday ("Chocolate Rain"), Gary Brolsma ("Numa Numa"), Tom Dickson (Will It Blend?) and Cara Cunningham ("Leave Britney Alone"). It became the most-viewed YouTube video the weekend after it was released, and has since been cited as a direct precursor to YouTube Rewind, as the first Rewind installment would come out the following year in 2009.
It was released in a standard edition and a "Deluxe Edition" with four bonus tracks and a booklet containing interviews with the band. Despite the strength of its four singles, it underperformed compared to its predecessor Make Believe.
Tracklist:
- "Troublemaker" (2:44)
- "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)" (5:52)
- "Pork and Beans" (3:09)
- "Heart Songs" (4:06)
- "Everybody Get Dangerous" (4:03)
- "Dreamin'" (5:12)
- "Thought I Knew" (3:01)
- "Cold Dark World" (3:51)
- "Automatic" (3:07)
- "The Angel and the One" (6:46)
Deluxe Edition bonus tracks:
- "Miss Sweeney" (4:02)
- "Pig" (4:02)
- "The Spider" (4:43)
- "King" (5:11)
Principal Members:
- Rivers Cuomo – lead vocals, guitar
- Brian Bell – guitar, backing vocals, lead vocals on "Thought I Knew"
- Scott Shriner – bass, backing vocals, lead vocals on "King"
- Patrick Wilson – drums, percussion, backing vocals, lead vocals on "Automatic"
I'll eat my candy with the Trope and Beans:
- Age-Progression Song: "Pig", a song about growing up, meeting a girl, getting married, having children, and finally dying. In the end, it's revealed that the protagonist is a literal pig who is slaughtered.
- Death Song: "The Spider", about Rivers lamenting about a spider trapped in a drain dying and the fragility of life. It's a lot sadder than it sounds.
- Boastful Rap: "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived" starts with one.
- Concept Album: The album features heavy themes of nostalgia.
- Epic Rocking: "The Angel and the One" which clocks in at about a whopping seven minutes.
- "I Am Great!" Song: "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived".
- I Am What I Am: "Pork And Beans" is about Rivers rejecting any change being pushed onto him and how he is happy with who he is.I'm a'do the things that I wanna do
I ain't got a thing to prove to you
I'll eat my candy with the pork and beans
Excuse my manners if I make a scene
I ain't gonna wear the clothes that you like
I'm fine and dandy with the me inside
One look at the mirror and I'm tickled pink
I don't give a hoot about what you think - List Song: "Heart Songs", which is Rivers rattling off his influences until it segues into an autobiographal account of how Rivers' roommate at the time played for him a copy of Nevermind by Nirvana, which inspired him to launch Weezer.
- Minimalistic Cover Art: It's a Weezer colored album. Of course it would be this.
- Pastiche: "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived" is a pastiche spanning eleven artists and genres. They are, in order of appearance:
- Rap
- Slipknot
- Jeff Buckley
- Choral
- Aerosmith
- Nirvana
- The Andrews Sisters
- Green Day
- Spoken Word
- Johann Sebastian Bach
- Ludwig van Beethoven
- Finally, they fall back on their regular sound for the last section.
- Porn Stache: Rivers sports one on the album cover.
- Soda-Candy 'Splosion: The music video
for "Pork and Beans" features a variety of then-popular viral videos, including Eepybird's "Extreme Mentos & Diet Coke". Rivers first sprays himself in the face with a single bottle, before Voltz and Grobe of Eepybird help enact a large-scale display of Diet Coke and Mentos eruptions behind the band. - Step Up to the Microphone: This album is notable for being the only Weezer album where every member has a writing credit and a lead vocal.
- Youth Is Wasted on the Dumb: "Everybody Get Dangerous" is a song about all of the stupid things Rivers and his friends did as kids, but one part that stands out is a game Rivers came up with called (which according to an interview was called "HOLY SHIT WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE"). While driving on a hill with a dead man's curve at the bottom, Rivers, without warning, would shift the car to neutral and rip the keys out of the ignition and toss them in the back seat, leaving his friends to scramble to give him back the car keys and restart the car as it goes rolling back down the hill before it reaches the bottom and crashes.
