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Weezer
Author: Martin Aston (Q)
Published: May 1995
"NERD UP!" headlined a droll review of Weezer's recent UK debut at hip London cubbyhole, The Splash Club. "Shameless geeks," warned another.
Is it because America's latest million-selling sensations dress like geeky nerds in a parody of Happy Days for their latest single, the supremely catchy 'Buddy Holly'? Or because bassist Matt Sharp cites Gary Numan and Jesus Christ Superstar as influences? Maybe it's the fact that singer and principal songwriter Rivers Cuomo favours National Health specs and a trainspotter anorak in real life.
The point being, presumably, that if you don't look like Kurt Cobain or Eddie Vedder, and if your loud guitars are poppy and perky rather than grimy and gloomy, then you're likely to be under suspicion from the Style Police.
Sharp surveys Weezer's British press with a mixture of mild amusement and bemusement. "This 'nerd' angle is exclusive to the British press for some reason," he sighs. "The press here has to latch on to one thing when they're faced with an unknown band, like when Nirvana and Soundgarden were around, everyone was grunge. Actually, we all shoot smack after each gig."
Hungry for a trend to follow grunge, the press have signalled a new punk rising in the wake of Green Day and Offspring's mega-sales in America. Weezer, being Americans in the habit of playing fast and buzzy pop, have been duly lumped in, but there is a strong absence of political agenda or a need to smash hotel rooms in revenge for childhood trauma. Cuomo, meanwhile, went to see classical conductor Simon Rattle in concert instead of pacing the dressing room before taking the stage in Birmingham last month. Nerdy? No, just brainy.
What Weezer do represent is a refusal to be sucked into the "spokesmen for a generation" game that reached its peak with Kurt Cobain and Eddie Vedder. Cuomo's sore throat is his excuse for avoiding today's chat but it's noticeable that, as soon as the going got good, Cuomo quickly hopped off the interview treadmill.
"When we started," Sharp recalls, "we figured we wouldn't get any press or success, so we did everything we had to. Rivers, being the main writer, did it all, and burnt out. He also feels that he doesn't want to constantly give personal stuff away, but to keep some sense of mystery."
"We certainly don't want to be put on a pedestal," drummer Brian Bell[sic] claims. "We just want to do what we do but we never thought it would do this well. Being a spokesman is too big a responsibility."
"All I know is that our popularity is because of Nirvana," Sharp contends. "Five years ago, American alternative radio was all considered British, like The Cure and Depeche Mode."
Having assembled in Los Angeles from various states of the union to have a stab at band life, Weezer's influences are both West Coastal (The Beach Boys) and East Coastal (The Pixies) but their brief is equally Anglophilic. The same went for The Cars, whose mainman Ric Ocasek produced Weezer's album.
Sharp: "At first, we didn't want anything to be out of the normal, but he was really persistent that we'd get the record we wanted but that it would be more of an experience to do it with him, rather than try and be low-key about everything."
Normal life, of course, went out of the window the day that American commercial radio and MTV picked up on Weezer's first single 'Undone – The Sweater Song'. Now it's touring, interviews and accusations of nerd-isms from all quarters.
"Yeah, it's gone from one extreme to the other," agrees Sharp. "I enjoy the fucked up way things have gone. Originally, we figured the album would sell 500 copies – we even wrote out a list of who we thought would buy it, like our parents and people in the office. Nobody used to come and see us play in LA. The good thing is, people called up on radio to hear us. In other words, nobody told anybody to buy the record, and that's what we enjoy the most."
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