Weezerpedia Discord Q&A with Karl Koch - March 2023

From Weezerpedia


MoonBright: Hey Karl who says "are we rolling" at the begining of waiting on you?

Karl: thats "we're rolling", coming thru the talkback from the control room. I cant quite tell if its Joe Barresi or Dave Fridmann. If i was sure when it was recorded, id be more sure, as Joe was January 1996, and Dave came in in May+

March 17, 2023 4:27 PM (#karlification)


dilavni.band(.com): that reminds me, theres someone saying a few lines at the end of keep fishin, who is that and what exactly are they saying

Karl: all i can hear is an exhalation and maybe a bit of a laugh, right as the last guitar notes are playing

dilavni.band(.com): its only on the album version

Karl: hmm thats what i thought i was listening to... please link me

dilavni.band(.com): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNj66k0WRk0 from around 2:15, he's in your right ear

Karl: ohh there, i was at the very end. ok thats gotta be Brian and/or Scott, they were doing the backing vocals.

March 17, 2023 4:53 PM (#karlification)


justinhoenke: Karl, what are some of the late 1997/all 1998 songs that you dig the most?

Karl: without actually reviewing the '98 material, i ant rightly say. Im probably forgetting many songs (not that theyre necessarily good). I do recall liking "Average Town" for example. I think you guys probably have all this stuff, as most were RC demos, not full band...? (And clearly the stuff that made it to Homie was the cream of the late 97 stuff)

March 17, 2023 4:31 PM (#karlification)


justinhoenke: @Karlophone ! Do you have any idea why “Across The Meadow” became the bonus track for Spring? I think it’s one of RC’s best tunes ever. Not kidding. And you know I go back to the beginning!

Karl: nope, but its very weezer to put the best track in the hardest to find spot

March 17, 2023 4:46 PM (#karlification)


MoonBright: To add to that, could you specify if having vinyl exclusive tracks is a RC push or a Crush push?

eted: If I remember correctly it was a Crush decision

Karl: Crush, strongly and repeatedly prodded by me for a long time, both re: Fan Club exclusive vinyl variants and Vinyl only bonus tracks. i guess it finally started sinking in

March 17, 2023 4:32 PM (#karlification)


eted: Karl, thank you for the awesome art on the fan club shirt!

Karl: thanks! Im just trying to make something people would wear. Alec Longstreth helped me with getting the layout better. And supplied the bird with a broken wing!

March 17, 2023 4:34 PM (#karlification)


MoonBright: When Matt was trying to get the band signed, was the consensus "oh well take whoever jumps for us first" or would it have to have been someone like geffen for RC to OK it

Karl: this is sort of fresh in my mind, as I covered this in a recent interview i did with Steve Coulter (once in Shufflepuck, RIdel High, etc), who is writing a book on the LA scene as influenced by weezers surprising success (shh! still under wraps). And anyway - Matt and Rivers had a combo of being very desperate and sure that we would only score a crappy deal, and also kind of gambling that one offer could lead to more if the cards were played extremely well. And that is what happened. Slash's (label) initial paltry offer, got other labels checking it out. Relativity had a slightly better but still awful offer. Then like 8 good labels listened, contemplated their orbs, and passed! Oops (meanwhile by pushing for the other labels to check it out, we were blowing off/pissing off the only labels who were willing to do anything). But then the tape that was sitting around on Tom Zutauts desk at geffen somehow made it into Todd Sullivans hands. And what seemed like "we blew it, should have gone with Relativity", turned into "god damn, the big leagues"

March 17, 2023 4:41 PM (#karlification)


Burnst Jamp: @Karlophone Been up to some SG research. Found these two pics on 'thespecialgoodness.net' from 2002. Does the alt 3-song promo cover ring a bell? And have you ever seen the bootleg cover?

Karl: 3 song promo cover was from Loosegroove Records (stone Gossard's label) but they ended up passing. I forget if that promo is "real", i have one, but its a cd-r with that cover printed out. the one on the right i think i made in photoshop, definitely for that '99 tour as Justin said, but used on the website, not printed for cd-rs we sold (as far as i can recall).

March 17, 2023 4:45 PM (#karlification)


MoonBright: For the anniversary of the black album, can we get scans of the 2019 weezine?

Karl: i believe i answered this before - i want to do a collected zines post #14 book, fan club store only. the '18 and '19 "VIP" zines would be in there, plus #17 tales of weezer + ??????

March 17, 2023 4:47 PM (#karlification)


dylan (HMC): Karl, do you have any sort of archive of Weezer's concert setlists? We've been doing a lot of work on Weezerpedia's concert archive lately, and any primary sources we could get on that front would be super helpful.

Karl: do you mean the physical pieces of paper? or the lists as data? I have a lot of saved setlists but certainly not all, and definitely its hit and miss for 2015 onward (but i do have a lot). as for the data itself, if you need a more trusted source than setlist.fm, i may have some word/excel files from various tours

March 17, 2023 7:49 PM (#karlification)