Pinkerton: Difference between revisions

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 ==Writing and composition==
-{{Template:Cleanup section}}
 {{Rivers Cuomo quote|There are some lyrics on the album that you might think are mean or sexist. I will feel genuinely bad if anyone feels hurt by my lyrics but I really wanted these songs to be an exploration of my "dark side" -- all the parts of myself that I was either afraid or embarrassed to think about before. So there's some pretty nasty stuff on the there. You may be more willing to forgive the mean lyrics if you see them as passing low points in a larger story. And this album really is a story: the story of the last 2 years of my life. And as you're probably well aware, these have been two very weird years.|[[Rivers Cuomo letter to the Weezer Fan Club, July 10, 1996|Letter to the Weezer Fan Club, July 10, 1996]]}}
 The first four tracks on ''Pinkerton'' (in addition to the album's B-sides) were written before Cuomo's leg surgery and subsequent semesters at Harvard, while the subsequent six tracks were written while attending Harvard. "[[Across the Sea]]" was inspired by a letter he'd received from a Japanese fan. "I had fantasies over this letter," said Cuomo,<ref name="ap" /> "I realized that I’d completely shut myself off from life, but I was still aware of Eros inside me. I hadn’t eliminated that part of me at all. I wasn’t a monk. I was just a perverted hermit." Cuomo subsequently used the contents of the letter to write "Across the Sea." "She basically wrote the lyrics to the first verse and part of the chorus, too," Cuomo later said of the girl.<ref name="courant">Catlin, Roger. "[[Hartford Courant interview with Rivers Cuomo - December 4, 1996|Weezer's worry]]" ''The Hartford Courant''. 4 December 1996.</ref> She has since, reportedly, received royalties for her contribution.<ref name="courant" /><ref name="ap">Daley, David. "[[Alternative Press interview with Weezer - January 1997|Happy [cancelled] Days]]". ''Alternative Press'', January 1997.</ref>
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 ''Pinkerton'' is named for the character B.F. Pinkerton from ''Madama Butterfly'', a U.S. naval officer (acknowledged by Cuomo to be similar to a touring rock star)<ref name="thepinkertondiaries" /> who marries a 15-year-old Japanese girl named Cio-Cio-San (the eponymous "Butterfly," from the Japanese word 蝶々, ''chōchō'') and then abandons her. Cuomo has referred to character as "the perfect symbol for the part of myself that I am trying to come to terms with on this album."<ref name="thepinkertondiaries" /> Other considered titles included "Playboy" and "Diving into the Wreck" (a reference to the poem of the same name by feminist poet Adrienne Rich).<ref name="thepinkertondiaries" />
-===Artwork===
+===Packaging===
 [[Image:Kambara yoru no yuki NYPL.jpg|thumb|325px|The original artwork adapted for the cover: ''Kambara yoru no yuki'' ("Night Snow at Kambara") by [[Hiroshige]].]]
 The artwork on the album's cover is "[[Kambara yoru no yuki]]" ("Night Snow at Kambara"), a print by Japanese ukiyo-e artist [[Hiroshige]]. Cuomo chose the cover after seeing it on a postcard sent to him by [[Jennifer Chiba]], finding that it "captured the feeling of winter loneliness" he was feeling living in Cambridge.<ref>https://books-r-fun.herokuapp.com/wiki/Pinkerton%20Cover%20Art</ref>
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 ==Release==
-Cuomo was intent on the album being received in the way he had devised it: as the serious work of a serious artist. This approach created tension within the band in regard to their music videos, as Cuomo wanted to avoid the "gimmicky" nature of the "[[Buddy Holly]]" video and keep focus on the music itself. The first music video shot for album was "El Scorcho." Despite Matt Sharp pushing for it, the band would pass on a video treatment proposed by [[Spike Jonze]], who had previously helped raise the band's status to platinum sales with the help of his "Buddy Holly" video. Cuomo wanted to take a straight approach to video making because he was against doing any big-budget videos since he felt the videos would "taint" his songs. Mark Romanek, the director of the video would eventually quit the video after numerous verbal arguments with Cuomo, leaving Cuomo to edit the video himself. The final video featured the band playing in an assembly hall in Los Angeles, surrounded by light fixtures of diverse origin, flashing in time to the music. It debuted on MTV's program 120 Minutes and only received moderate airplay on the channel.
+Cuomo rejected a proposed music video treatment by [[Spike Jonze]] for "[[El Scorcho]]" that would have starred [[Wikipedia:Flava Flav|Flava Flav]]. "I want my feelings to come across untainted this time around" said Cuomo,<ref>Lewman, Mark. "[[Rip magazine interview with Rivers Cuomo - January 1997|Ol' Nerdy Bastard]]" ''Rip''. January 1997.</ref> "So when I went to write the songs, I was very careful about being really straightforward and sincere. And not being so ironic, or using weird metaphors or imagery. I really want to communicate my feelings directly, and because I was so careful in writing the songs that way, I'd hate for the video to kinda misrepresent the song, or exaggerate certain aspects." The video for "El Scorcho" was instead directed by [[Mark Romanek]] who, after an apparent disagreement, left Cuomo to edit the video himself. It debuted on MTV's ''120 Minutes'' and only received moderate airplay.
+On [[September 23]], [[1996]], the day before the release of ''Pinkerton'', the Pinkerton private investigation and security company filed a temporary restraining order against Geffen and Weezer, seeking a preliminary injunction aimed the album from being marketed. On [[September 26]], Judge John G. Davies dissolved the order, deciding that "the hardship of not releasing the album would be greater for Geffen than any hardship Pinkerton's or its shareholders might incur from consumers who mistakenly think the company had anything to do with the album."<ref>"[https://www.upi.com/Archives/1996/09/26/Weezer-Geffen-beat-Pinkerton-in-court/1340843710400/ Weezer, Geffen beat Pinkerton in court]" ''UPI Archives''. 26 September 1996.</ref>
-Just as "El Scorcho" was gaining momentum on the radio, - and at MTV and a day before the album was to be released for public sale on September 24, 1996, - a restraining order was obtained against the band and Geffen by Encino, California-based security firm, Pinkerton's Inc. The company sued the band and Geffen for alleged federal trademark infringement, claiming that Weezer was trying to capitalize on the company's reputation. Under the terms of the restraining order, which had Pinkerton's Inc seeking two million dollars in damages, Weezer would be kept from "selling, distributing, or advertising an album with the name Pinkerton." Geffen spokesman Dennis Dennehy, defended the title stating "to Weezer, Pinkerton is a character in Puccini's opera Madame Butterfly... It was not meant to be aimed at any sort of corporate entity." Cuomo wrote up a six-page paper defending his choice of the title. He described what the papers entailed, it "explain[ed] why [he] chose it, and how it works for the album, and how it's essential." Although a federal court hearing had been initially set for October 3, the seriousness of the legal and financial ramifications surrounding the album forced the case to be expedited to September 26. Due to the cover art which was akin to the Puccini's opera, the case was thrown out-of-court, after the judge dissolved the previous court order to have the CDs pulled after determining "that the hardship of not issuing the ''Pinkerton'' disc would be greater for Geffen than any hardship Pinkerton's Inc or its shareholders might incur from consumers who mistakenly presume the company has anything to do with the album."
 The second single fared much worse than the first single. Noticing the commercial failure of the album, the band had to compromise to make the video more to the liking of MTV. The music video for "The Good Life", was directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, features a pizza delivery girl (played by Mary Lynn Rajskub) on her route, highlighting the monotony of her job. The music video is noted for its use of simultaneous camera angles appearing on screen as a fractured full image. The video was rush-released by the record company to try to save the commercially-failing album, but was not successful.