Weezerpedia Discord Q&A with Karl Koch - March 2024

From Weezerpedia


Jeremy: Quote: Karl's Corner - 1/22/02: "when the Blue Album was being recorded, there was a lot of brainstorming going on as to what this record would look like. I kept coming up with what I can say in retrospect were some rather kooky ideas, and Rivers kept pushing for something simpler."

Do you have any recollection of what some of these "kooky ideas" may have entailed?

Karl: i do. but rn holding some cards close for various reasons. one way or another, youll have more info at some point

March 2, 2024 3:57 PM (#karlification)

Jeremy: This one comes from ⁠#help, think you could #⁠help them out at all?:

"I have been doing a lot of research over the last week on the production of Pinkerton, especially the drum sound. Do you happen to have any of the track sheets for Pinkerton archived and would you be able to share some? It would really help in figuring out what they might've done in terms of mic choice and any potential gear they would be running through to achieve such a sound. Thanks!" - @CJ

Karl: i actually have scans of all the pinkerton reels and tracksheets, but not prepared to dig them up at this time. most of them dont revela the secrets youre looking for though - in most cases its like "Track 10: bass"

Karl: one thing i can say is that many of the songs were more than 24 track, because we ran out of tracks and were not done overdubbing. so 2 machines had to be synced up to run together, a tedious process that took a whole day to sort out. I also think somehow a computer running an early protools rig had to be brought in and used to make the sync work somehow (printing timecode perhaps??). It was very arcane/wizardy stuff for 1996, that is for damn sure.

March 2, 2024 6:18 PM (#karlification)


nimrod: is it also true that rivers recorded butterfly at 4am on the last night?

Karl: yep! and my drumming was on the last 2 takes, take 5 and 6 i believe. the first 4 had no drums. we did it live (playing together, mic'ed up separately to our own tracks)
the bass drum was turned on its side and i sat next to it, playing it with big fuzzy mallets
that was on the last night in Sound City. later there was some random 1 day sessions here and there at other studios to finish bits and pieces that summer. Rachel Haden sang "IJTOTLOMD" at some other studio, nailed it on her first try.

March 2, 2024 6:23 PM (#karlification)


Moony B'deedle: were you there when butterfly was recorded? and if so did rivers wake you up specifically for its recording

Karl: see above. was there and then participated on the sideways bass drum. I was Rivers' driver, so i was there every night till he decided it was bedtime.

March 2, 2024 6:29 PM (#karlification)


nimrod: tragic girl was also recorded at one of these one day sessions too right

Karl: yes, that was super last minute, happened on a day i was back east for a few days. as the P:dlx liner notes said, i didnt even know it was recorded for like 15 years. no one mentioned, it, no one labeled the tape, and it wasnt used. "i go away for 3 days, and look what happens!!"

March 2, 2024 6:31 PM (#karlification)

theangel: Karl, what was the band's relationship with The Offspring back in the 90s? I know Rivers was friends with Dexter at least. Thoughts on their music?

Karl: not much offspring contact outside of random shared festival bills etc. Rivers i think had dinner with Dexter at one point around 2000, they picked each others brains. i think thats when i learned (from RC) he was actually a braniac (like RC) and flew planes (very NOT like RC)

March 2, 2024 6:36 PM (#karlification)

Burnst Jamp: Speaking of Desire's cover art, it was once stated that it came from a "book of old litograph images". Which book was that?
(looked it up and apparently it was "once stated" two years ago in this very channel lol)

Karl: oh i have the book still, one sec -
found an image online

March 7, 2024 6:37 AM (#karlification)

Karl: New addition to the vault, this is the original of this version of the '99 tour edition CD. It was just sent to me from its original owner. the other 2 "originals" are the one with the Handsome Boy Modeling School guys standing in the woods, and the one with the car (was "Roadmaster" by Gene Clark originally). Most others from that tour are photocopies from those 3 color original covers.But real stickers still went on the CDs usually, till we ran out of Handsome Boy Modeling School stickers.

March 8, 2024 1:15 PM (#karlification)


justinhoenke: Karl, anything you can tell me about this 1999 SG tour CD that I own? I recall Mikey creating artwork at the Club Laga SG show

Karl: only that its the same "version" that i just posted above. we had like 100 burned discs on a spool but they had no art, pat made them himself. Mikey and I started making impromptu art for them as we sold them at the shows. the back cover was printed at Pats house and xeroxed at a kinkos somewhere. then the rest was up to chance and the stack of Handsome Boy Modeling School stickers we found at a club.

March 9, 2024 5:00 PM (#karlification)

Jeremy: Karl, what fruits are currently in your kitchen?

Karl: this is the content im here for
there are in fact bananas. and (always forget which are truly fruits or not) avocados, tomatoes, strawberries
oh and lemons. the nacho trifecta MUST be available at all times

Moony B'deedle: Peppers are technically fruits and are encouraged as per karl koch nacho recipe

Karl: banana peppers and jalapeno peppers are the other fruit of the trifecta. meant to include! flubbed it with the actual standard bananas (haha i said "peppers" there, thats a good way to really confuse the shit out of this mess even more) which are present and count as fruit (i think? lol) but are NOT recommended for nachos in any way

March 10, 2024 4:09 PM (#karlification)


deckra: karl, a vast majority of the words you say in this channel i manually archive on weezerpedia for referential use. is this conversation noteworthy enough to be listed in the archive for march?

Karl: really it should just replace the entire frontpage

March 10, 2024 4:15 PM (#karlification)

orbitron: hey karl, in the time since you did the recording history, have you been made aware of any other recordings done by pat and rivers in hamburg in feb 95? you mentioned that as well as blast off, probably 2-3 other songs were done

Karl: defintely no new info has been had, but i believe the other tunes would have been Pat working up some early SG/HG/TSG songs. that may in fact be the source of some of his early demos that are known of
As for Rivers, i cant recall but yeah it wasnt just Blast Off......???? makes me need to go dig but ive no time at the moment

March 12, 2024 5:34 PM (#karlification)

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