Weezer’s, Drummer Patrick Wilson, says the band will be heading back to the studio to record their seventh studio album this November. They plan to work a Jacknife Lee, a producer who worked on a few tracks from the Red Album, including “Troublemaker” and “Pork and Beans.” Wilson says they have already begun working on songs, sending everything they come up with to Lee. Sounds like they must be working on some new songs, though according to Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo, “some will be covers, others will be previously released Weezer tracks.

“We might do them acoustically or with an orchestra,” he said. “I’m thinking about something like ‘Slave’ or ‘December’ from Maladroit and maybe some old songs. I see us doing heavy versions of emotional songs.”

While some people might be annoyed that they would release older songs on a supposedly new album, I think it actually sounds interesting. Perhaps a reinterpretation of their better material would be more worthy listening material than just another cookie cutter single.

As for the album title, apparently Pat Wilson is a fan of doing it rainbow style, admitting, “if I had my way, we would just use colors from now on, then we wouldn’t have to think about titles. We must’ve had a hundred titles for the (’Red’) record, and none of them felt right so we just gave up and said, ‘OK, let’s just make a color.” Hopefully with the time they gain from not thinking too hard about album titles, they can think harder about how they can write a decent song (a.k.a how much they have to pay to make Matt Sharp re-join the band).

Weezer sure has had a busy, interactive year. After spending the last few months asking their fans to come out and play, they are now asking for video clips of anything “artistic, abstract, and/or weird” for their upcoming tour, which is currently being referred to as “The Weezer 2008 North American Troublemaker Tour.” So if you have some cool footage get over to the Weezer Tour Imagery Group on YouTube and upload it for your chance to be a part of their next kick-ass show. If not, grab your camera and go film something cool. Don’t worry about using your brain too much since they specifically say they do not want anything with a story or meaning. So it would be pretty hard to fail. At least not as bad as this guy. So what are you waiting for? Go get your Tarantino on and maybe you could see the fruits of your labor on the big screen at one of Weezer’s upcoming shows:

09-09 Nagoya, Japan - Aichiken Kinrou-Kaikan
09-10 Fukuoka, Japan - Zepp Fukuoka
09-12 Tokyo, Japan - Zepp Tokyo
09-13 Osaka, Japan - Intex Hall
09-15 Tokyo, Japan - Yoyogi Arena
09-23 Boston, MA - Tsongas Arena *
09-24 New York, NY - Madison Square Garden *
09-26 Atlantic City, NJ - Borgata Casino *
09-27 Camden, NJ - Susquehanna Bank Center *
09-29 Detroit, MI - The Palace of Auburn Hills *
09-30 Toronto, Ontario - Air Canada Center *
10-02 Rosemont, IL - All State Arena *
10-03 St. Paul, MN - Xcel Energy Center *
10-05 Denver, CO - Broomfield Event Center *
10-07 Salt Lake City, UT - E Center *
10-09 Portland OR - Memorial Coliseum *
10-10 Vancouver, British Columbia - GM Place *
10-11 Seattle, WA - Key Arena *
10-13 San Jose, CA - Events Center *
10-14 Los Angeles, CA - Great Western Forum *
10-17 San Diego, CA - Cox Arena *
10-18 Phoenix, AZ - Arizona State Fair *
10-20 Austin, TX - Frank Erwin Center *
10-21 Dallas, TX - Nokia Theater *
10-23 Houston, TX - Reliant Arena *
10-25 Atlanta, GA - Gwinnett Arena *

* with Tokyo Police Club, Angels & Airwaves (opening band FAIL)

Weezer have announced their first North American headlining tour in 3 years. The tour will begin September 23rd in Boston and end on October 25th in Atlanta and will see the band playing large arenas in support of the recently released “Red” album.

The tour will last five weeks and visit 21 cities, including…”New York’s Madison Square Garden (Sept. 24), Detroit’s Palace of Auburn Hills (Sept. 29), Chicago’s Allstate Arena (Oct. 2), Seattle’s Key Arena (Oct. 11), Los Angeles’ Forum (Oct. 14) and Dallas’ Nokia Theater (Oct. 21).”

No ticket prices or pre-sale information has been made available yet and the full list of dates has not been released.

Source.

Whoever Weezer’s PR person is, they sure do a good job of getting the band out promoting their new record and tours. Weezer has recorded a set with AOL Sessions, re-working a lot of songs with acoustic guitars, unplugged.

The band recorded acoustic/unplugged versions of “Pork and Beans” and “Troublemaker” as well as “Why Bother” from their classic Pinkerton album, which is performed very well.

The band also performed 3 Red album b-sides, which were available previously. “Miss Sweeney,” “It’s Easy,” and “King” were the songs, they also participated in a Q&A about the Red album, which I’m sure fans will find interesting.

Check it all out here.

As I reported last week, Weezer came up with some different ideas regarding live shows. The band set out on a handful of dates promoted by radio stations in select cities.

The idea was to have all sorts of different people come out and join the band in choosing and playing songs. Particpants could bring their electric guitars, acoustics, or whatever other instruments they wanted.

The results of the Portland, OR Hootenany stop were documented by radio station 94.7. Check out some video here…

Weezer: Hootenany Portland, OR

It seems while other bands are taking a novel approach to releasing albums, Weezer are taking a novel approach to touring. The band will be launching a full scale tour this fall, but this summer fans can expect something altogether different.

“Now, via a post on their website and the handy video you’ll see, Rivers and co. have laid out a few more details of the “Hootenanny” on us, and even offered up a little guitar lesson.

“The first date is today in Phoenix, with the city’s own The Edge 103.9 (”Adam All Morning, Alternative Rock All Day”) handling the contest. Winners are implored to “bring an instrument (or at least your voice and hands)”– and any instrument will do, it seems– to the private locale and prepare those power chords. The performance will be recorded for future airing on the radio station.

The song selection for each gig will more than likely change with every new date, but here’s Phoenix’s spate: “Pork and Beans”, “Island in the Sun”, a cover of Radiohead’s “Creep”, “Say It Ain’t So”, “El Scorcho”, and, of course, “Beverly Hills.”

This seems like a cool idea for fans of the band, I can especially see younger, newer fans being really into this. If you win, you can bring your strat, tele, les paul, or whatever instrument you want. I’m just curious to see how this will turn out. Should be very intereting, good ol’ Weezer…

Source.

So its pretty much been decided by critics and fans alike, the new Weezer album will suck. Well, at least the 1/3 of it that has been released via iTunes and leaked so far. Lead singer Rivers Cuomo has another trick up his sleeve. He’s writing a new song, only he’s not just writing it, he is asking you to write it with him.

The Weezer singer has taken to YouTube where he has asked people to help participate in contributing riffs, lyrics and structure to a song. This has been going for quite a while now, but he is still writing/working on it. The title has also been selected for the song, it is “80’s Radio,” not really surprising that Rivers went with that title, is it?

He is currently on “Step #10″ writing lyrics to the bridge of the song. Rivers says “Don’t try to be a William Shakespeare,” this is funny. Maybe people shouldn’t try to be a William Shakespeare…It would be nice however, if a recent Weezer song would come out containing at least some decent lyrics, besides random crap about being a rock star and/or famous person. This song actually sounds better than anything that I’ve heard from the forthcoming “Red Album” but it still sucks.

Open Letter/Note to Weezer:

Bury the hatchet and get Matt Sharp back in the band, start playing cool Fender Jaguars again and rehearsing in a house, (like in the “Say It Ain’t So” music video) and get Ric Ocasek of The Cars as a producer again and THEN record a new album and tour. Otherwise, just break up already! Jeez…

Help Rivers Write a Song @ YouTube.com

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I posted about Weezer gearing up to release their new record last week and that some new songs from it had found their way online.

The release date of the album has now been pushed up to 6/3 presumably because of the online leaks. A digital single for the “The Greatest Man That Ever Lived (Variations on a Shaker Hymn)” is now available for purchase on iTunes and inclues the lyrics…

“I’ve got the money/ And I’ve got the fame/ You’ve got the hots / To ride on my plane.” This line, which Pitchfork has marked as being “another Beverly Hills,” if indicative of the rest of the album, will be pretty horrible. The first single “Pork & beans” got a lot of Weezer fans excited because of its fuzz box guitar sound and harmony vocals, reminiscent of the bands finer moments on their classic Blue and Pinkerton albums. Unfortunately most of the songs that have surfaced online so far don’t really reflect this style and most fans seems to be pretty displeased with what they’ve heard so far.

Unless the other tracks on the album are really really amazing, its pretty safe to say you should avoid the Red Album. I might piss some people off in saying this but…All in all I don’t think Weezer’s been legitimately good since…oh…1996. I think its time to throw in the towel guys, sorry.

Source.

Some new Weezer tracks have surfaced from the bands upcoming “Red Album” with the funny cover. The track “Pork and Beans” has been getting pretty heavy modern/mainstream rock airplay on stations such as KROQ. Many fans hoped this would be a return to the bands Blue Album/Pinkerton sound due to the fuzzed out Fender sound the track had.

Most of these newly surfaced songs however aren’t really even on the same level as “Pork & Beans”. It seems like band leader Rivers Cuomo has been trying to recapture the sound the band had in 1994 for…well…14 years, but to no avail. Working with Rick Rubin doesn’t help matters either, as Rick Rubin is to music as Michael Bay is to film.

Also, its relatively annoying that every Weezer single is the past oh 5 or 6 years seems to reference fame/and or wealth, its really kind of lame. Anyway, don’t take my word for it, judge for yourself…

New Weezer Songs @ Stereogum.com