Songs from the Black Hole

From Weezerpedia
Revision as of 07:35, 3 December 2008 by Soupandballoons (talk | contribs) (Unprotected "Songs from the Black Hole")
Jump to: navigation, search
Songs from the Black Hole
Songs from the Black Hole cover
Demo by Weezer
Released Unreleased
Recorded Christmas 1994 at (Beverly's home, February 1995 in Hamburg Germany
Genre Alternative rock, progressive rock
Length Tracklist 2 was aprx. 25 minutes
Label Would have been DGC Records
Producer(s) Rivers Cuomo
Weezer chronology
Weezer
(1994)
Songs from the Black Hole
(1995)
Pinkerton
(1996)
Alternate cover
Fan made cover.  It has become somewhat the "official" cover for fans.
Fan made cover. It has become somewhat the "official" cover for fans.

Songs from the Black Hole (SFTBH) is an unreleased, unfinished Weezer album. A space themed rock opera/musical, it was originally envisioned as the follow-up album to The Blue Album, but over the course of recording, the album's concept was discarded and the album was transformed into Pinkerton. Some of the SFTBH songs ended up on Pinkerton (or as b-sides), some slightly altered lyrically and sonically. SFTBH was, in the words of songwriter Rivers Cuomo, "supposed to be a whole album of songs transed together," meaning a seamless flow from one song to the next (previous examples of this technique include the closing medley of The Beatles' Abbey Road and various Pink Floyd albums including The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here).

In a 2007 Rolling Stone Rock & Roll Daily feature the album was called one of rock music's "mythical lost masterpieces." In an April 2007 issue of the Australian weekly print mag "Zoo", the album was named number 7 in their "Top 10 Never Released Albums" list. Songs from the Black Hole also ranked #7 on a list of the top ten albums you have never heard.

History

The characters were to be Jonas (voiced by Rivers), Laurel (voiced by Rachel Haden of that dog.), Maria (voiced by Joan Wasser of the Dambuilders), Wuan & Dondó (voiced by Brian Bell and Matt Sharp), and a robot, M1 (voiced by Karl Koch). At the time, Joan was unaware of Rivers' intention of having her play a role on the album.

In the words of Rivers, taken from an interview in the November 15, 2007 issue of Rolling Stone, "There's this crew - three guys and two girls and a mechanoid - that are on this mission in space to rescue somebody, or something. The whole thing was really an analog for taking off, going out on the road and up the charts with a rock band, which is what was happening to me at the time I was writing this and feeling like I was lost in space."

Over the course of writing the album, Rivers, who'd enrolled at Harvard in the fall of 1995, changed his focus from the space rock opera theme of SFTBH to the Madama Butterfly theme of Pinkerton. Pinkerton was released on September 24, 1996 and included the songs "Tired of Sex", "Getchoo", "No Other One", and "Why Bother?". These four songs had been written prior to the conception of SFTBH but reshaped for SFTBH. Rivers had unshaped them for inclusion on Pinkerton. Further leftovers "Devotion", "Waiting on You", and "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams" surfaced as b-sides to the Pinkerton singles El Scorcho and The Good Life. "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams" is notable as it features Rachel Haden singing lead vocals.

In 2002, several Songs from the SFTBH demos were 'leaked' on the internet. These included "Blast Off!", "Oh No, This Is Not For Me", "Come to My Pod", "Tired of Sex" and "Longtime Sunshine". Another demo, "You Won't Get With Me Tonight", was officially released on a Buddyhead compilation in 2003. A very short clip of the band rehearsing "Superfriend" in Sound City Studios in Van Nuys, California, in January 1996, was released on the Weezer DVD Video Capture Device in 2004.

Sheet music and lyrics for several unreleased Songs from the Black Hole tracks were made available by Rivers on his MySpace starting on April 30, 2006. Lyrics were posted for "Blast Off!", "Who You Callin' Bitch?", "Oh Jonas", "Please Remember", "Oh No, This Is Not For Me", "She's Had a Girl", and "Now I Finally See", while sheet music was posted for "She's Had a Girl", "Who You Callin' Bitch?" and "Oh Jonas". It remains to be seen whether this will continue for the rest of the SFTBH material. He also posted that the song "Lisa", long thought to be part of Track List 2 (see below) and the name of the second female character, was not actually part of SFTBH. This left the character's name to be unknown (for the time being). Rivers could not recall the name, but referred to her as "the good girl."

In a November 2006 interview with a Bloomfield Hills local radio station Pat Wilson told two students that he remembers being caught in Germany and Rivers using a recording studio to record what he wanted to be a rock album. Pat stated that he never knew more about SFTBH other than Rivers wanted to make a concept album.

On December 18th, 2007, Rivers Cuomo released a collection of his home demos entitled Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo. The collection contained demos from 1992 until 2007. The collection also included five demos for songs intended for or included on Songs From the Black Hole: "Longtime Sunshine", "Blast Off!", "Who You Callin' Bitch?", "Dude, We're Finally Landing", and "Superfriend." This was the first time fans got to hear "Who You Callin' Bitch?", "Dude, We're Finally Landing", and a high quality version of "Superfriend." In the Alone booklet, Rivers explained some of the plot points of the musical, and, after having reviewed his journal notes of SFTBH, revealed that the Good Girl's name is Laurel.

3 more tracks are set to be released November 25th, 2008 on Alone 2. Including: Oh Jonas, Please Remember and Come To My Pod.

Three copies of the album are known to exist in CD-R form. Two of them are in the care of Karl Koch, while the third copy is in Rivers' personal archive. These CDs contain the tracks from Track List 2 (see below).

Track Lists

Of the two track lists composed for the album, Track List 2 is supposedly closer to what the finished album's track list would have been. Rivers compiled Track List 2 using several newly recorded songs and took out numerous songs that apparently were no longer needed, either due to their new status as 'real' second album songs, or due to simple creative changes of heart.

Track List 1

  1. "Blast Off!" (2:02)
  2. "You Won't Get with Me Tonight" (3:28)
  3. "Maria's Theme" (0:26)
  4. "Come to My Pod" (1:31)
  5. "This Is Not For Me" (0:44)
  6. "Tired of Sex" (2:42)
  7. "Superfriend" (3:30)
  8. "She's Had a Girl" (0:55)
  9. "Good News!" (1:05)
  10. "Now I Finally See" (0:40)
  11. "Gitchoo" [a.k.a Getchoo] (2:54)
  12. "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams" (2:38)
  13. "No Other One" (2:46)
  14. "Devotion" (3:16)
  15. "What Is This I Find?" (1:20)
  16. "Longtime Sunshine" (3:17)
  17. "Longtime Sunshine(Reprise)" (0:30)

Track List 2

  1. "Blast Off!" (2:02)
  2. "Who You Callin' Bitch?" (0:45)
  3. "Oh Jonas" [renamed from "Maria's Theme"] (0:26)
  4. "Please Remember" (0:37)
  5. "Come to My Pod" (1:31)
  6. "Oh No, This Is Not For Me" (0:44)
  7. "Tired of Sex" (2:42)
  8. "She's Had a Girl" (0:55)
  9. "Dude, We're Finally Landing" [renamed from "Good News!"] (1:05)
  10. "Now I Finally See" (0:40)
  11. "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams" (2:38)
  12. "Superfriend" (3:30)
  13. "Superfriend (Reprise)" (0:25)
  14. "You Won't Get with Me Tonight" (3:28)
  15. "What Is This I Find?" (1:20)

Other Songs

  1. "Why Bother?"
  2. "Waiting on You"
  3. "Longtime Sunshine (Special 'Coda' Mix)"

Note: These songs are not officially on either track list but were worked on along with the rest of the SFTBH tracks at the time.

"You Won't Get with Me Tonight" can be found on the compilation album "Gimme Skelter" by Buddyhead Records. "Longtime Sunshine", "Blast Off!", "Who You Callin' Bitch?", "Dude, We're Finally Landing", and "Superfriend" were officially released on Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo and "Oh Jonas", "Please Remeber" and "Come To My Pod" on Alone II. "Oh No, This is Not For Me" can be found online.

Formal studio versions of "Tired of Sex", "Getchoo", "No Other One", and "Why Bother?" are included on Pinkerton as the first four tracks. "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams" and "Waiting on You" may be found on "The Good Life" single and "Devotion" may be found on the "El Scorcho" single.

Demand for SFTBH

To this day, SFTBH tracks remain a holy grail for many Weezer fans. Over the years several petitions have been started with the aim of making the band release the lost "Black Hole" demos much in the same way the ss2k songs were released; the most recent petition was launched by Weezer fans on November 27th, 2005, with the goal of reaching 1000 signatures. It reached its goal of 1000 signatures on March 1st, 2006.

On October 4th, 2005 during a Weezer show at Allstate Arena in Rosemont, Illinois, the band invited a fan up onstage to play the rhythm guitar for Undone - The Sweater Song. The fan took advantage of this moment to attempt to get the band to play "Blast Off!" by beginning to play the intro to the song and sang the first four lines of the song before Rivers laughed and jokingly pushed him away from the mic. After they finished "Undone", Weezer guitarist Brian Bell and Rivers all laughed at the fan's idea.[9] In early 2006 a low-quality video bootleg of the show began to circulate around various Weezer message boards and included the fan's special performance of "Undone" and Rivers' subsequent reaction.

Once Rivers posted the lyrics and music for some of the SFTBH tracks, fans were able to cover the songs despite not having heard them. Rivers has even posted comments about the covers he has heard: "By the way, I'm very disappointed not to be hearing any women out there singing Maria's parts. What gives?" (on "Who You Callin' Bitch?") and "Good luck figuring out the time changes... No one's gotten it yet. Look at it this way: 3 beats in a 3/4 measure go by in the same amount of time as 2 beats in a 6/4 measure. Also, these last two sawngs (sic) are elided so that the pickup note of "Oh, Jonas" is the last beat of the last bar of "Who You Callin'" (on "Oh Jonas")."

The future

Rivers Cuomo has stated on his blog that he is unable to release any of his demos (including Black Hole songs) because of his contractual obligations to Geffen Records. Geffen has the exclusive right to release his music:

"...Someday that may change but it won’t be anytime soon...Until I can figure out a way to compensate Geffen records (and in the case of covers songs, the songwriters) I can’t give away my recordings."

In his blog, Rivers also talked about playing his demos to Jordan Schur, the president of Weezer's label, Geffen Records:

"...when we were starting to work on Make Believe in 2003, I sat down with Jordan and played him hours of my old demos, going all the way back to the beginnings of Weezer. He didn’t think any of them were album-worthy. Neither did I. The one song he thought was good was “Blast Off” but it “needs a new chorus.” I agreed."

But Rivers did leave fans with some hope that the songs could eventually be heard:

"Thanks to all who have expressed their interest in my unreleased recordings. I hope that everything of quality is eventually made available."

In a 2006 interview, commenting on speculation that Make Believe would be Weezer's last album, Pat Wilson (the band's drummer) stated that he would be interested in releasing a compilation of "lost" Weezer tracks. This fueled rumours that the band would release previously unheard Black Hole songs or a completely re-worked version of the "Songs from the Black Hole" concept album in the near future.

Rivers' photo on his MySpace page on December 25th, 2005 was an image of the Wonder Twins, "sidekicks to the Super Friends in the Hanna-Barbera animated television series of the same name". Some fans believed that this was a sign that the 2005 holiday treat would be a high quality mp3 of "Superfriend" but this was later proved to be false.

On April 30, 2006, Rivers released this statement in his blog, and in the process confirmed that the home recordings of the Black Hole songs will be released sometime in the future:

"Thanks for your interest in these songs! I'm putting up the lyrics now because I suddenly realized that I can. I'll also put up the sheet music (when I have time) so that you can play them for each other! I'll release my home demos as soon as I am legally able."

It is unclear however if the recent online petition which garnered over 1000 signatures has influenced his decision.

On October 15, 2007 Rivers posted a blog on his official blog stating that he had permission from Geffen to release a collection of demos spanning 1992-2007, Alone - The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo. Shortly after, in an interview with Rolling Stone, Rivers revealed that many of the songs on the CD will be unreleased demos from Songs From The Black Hole.[10] A news post on Geffen's official website read, "The vast majority will be new to even the most die-hard Weezer fan," hinting that the SFTBH demos will be songs previously never heard.[11] In an Alternative Press interview from October 30, 2007, Rivers revealed that "Blast Off!", "Who You Calling Bitch?", "Dude, We're Finally Landing" and "Superfriend" are slated to be on the album. It has been reported that "Longtime Sunshine" will also be on the record. A clip of this song was posted on weezer.com on November 27, 2007, along with clips of "Superfriend" and "Blast Off!", confirming that it will also be on Alone.

On November 22, 2007, Rivers updated his blog, stating "I want to share with everyone the excitement I felt when I went back and heard the original master tapes of these demos. In most cases, they sounded much better than the mp3s I've been listening to for years--clearer, warmer, deeper. I highly recommend that listeners buy the CD rather than the digital version so that they can enjoy the highest quality listening experience."

Possible connection to The Rentals

When Rivers was asked on a chat room interview what the reason was for not releasing Songs From the Black Hole, he simply stated "ROTR". He was referring to Weezer bassist Matt Sharp's then new band The Rentals, whose first album was titled Return of the Rentals (ROTR). This album was released in 1995, in between Weezer's first two albums.

Cuomo has further hinted that sonically and aesthetically, Sharp's Return of the Rentals borrowed much of its sound from Rivers drafts of Songs from the Black Hole, thus discouraging Rivers from further pursuing the sound out of fear of the public thinking he was "stealing" Matt's sound with The Rentals.

However, some Weezer fans have speculated that originally both Matt and Rivers were writing songs for Songs From the Black Hole. Once Matt decided that he wanted to take his songs to The Rentals, the weight of the album rested solely on Rivers shoulders, and eventually he decided to scrap the idea.

Lyrics

A Sharp-penned song entitled "Mrs.Young" was demoed in May of 1993. Sharp wrote the core of the song but asked Cuomo for assistance on filling in details of the song and the performance on the demo.

This song was later reworked into "Please Let That Be You", which appeared on Return of The Rentals. Some portions of the lyrics may have themes that could be linked to the space theme of Songs From the Black Hole.


“Lost out in the machinery/[...]/Walk around the complex/No visitors, no oxygen/Just me, no movement/[...]/Empty, everything's technical, sterile, and endless/Inside, a malfunction ”
— "Please Let That Be You", Return of the Rentals


“The love I'm searching for in this machine/The systems failed, all the circuits blown, and the message lost in this machine

Tried all the codes, all possibilities, all combinations, but still nothing/Called for backup from my assistants but no one seems to know anything/Disconnect, shut the main reactor down, and separate from this technology”
— "The Love I'm Searching For", Return of The Rentals


Furthermore, an early version of 'The Love I'm Searching For' can be found on the Rentals' bootleg 'Excellent Stocking Stuffer.' In this earlier take, the lyric "you should be with me" is revealed to have originally been "the mission must be complete." This ties into SFTBH in that several songs from the known SFTBH track lists also mention a mission. In 'Blast Off', there are lyrics referring to 'the purpose of the mission.


“I try/You know I try/I try/As hard as it may be the mission must be complete.”
— "The Love I'm Searching For", Excellent Stocking Stuffer


In another interesting twist of events, when the Rentals reunited in 2005 and began touring, the band would cover Weezer's "I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams", a song originally intended for Songs from the Black Hole. Rachel Haden, who performs vocals on the Weezer version, handles lead vocal duties when played live with the Rentals, as she is part of the newly formed incarnation of the Rentals.

It is presently unknown if there is any truth to these theories or if they are simply speculation on the part of fans.