Weezer – “Make Believe”

How does one make believe exactly? Read a little Lewis Carroll? Step into a hot bath with the ghost of Orson Welles Future? No, none of the above! One simply listens to this fantasically underrated masterpiece by none other than Weezer. It takes loads of guts to create such an effort that goes against the grain, and that could have easily appeared on the soundtrack to “Top Gun.” Rivers Cuomo truly becomes a generic lyric maestro on this release, but a maestro is a maestro. In short, young master Cuomo is king of Pop craft, he is like the best of Nirvana, The Beach Boys and The Cars rolled into one tiny little chap. Now more than ever, Rivers is Weezer, and there is a lot that is accomplished on this highly polished and glossy effort.

Rivers discovered a lot on this album as it relates to a middle-aged gent, and this is something to be respected. Rock doesn’t always need to be some glamorous suicide, as some Pop icons need the courage to grow both old and potentially laughable, and Rivers is just such a chap. The lyrics are heavily edited to only the most obvious of clichés, but this is by design…Because; as has been popularly mentioned about Rivers Cuomo on more than one occasion, HE is WEIRD, but alas, HIS MUSIC is NOT. I find this to be an understandable summary of a rather complex musical talent. Like even the best of Weezer records, which this decidedly is not according to the popular consensus, this is largely a singles album. Maybe not quite as catchy as “Green” or perhaps not as emotionally raw as “Pinkerton,” but it is a healthy mix of each.

I suggest giving this album another chance, play it on repeat and drink a nice cold glass of bottled water. Bold blanketed statements absolutely cake this record, “We Are All on Drugs” and “Beverly Hills” being the most obvious. The chorus hooks repeat like a mantra, and appropriately so, what with Rivers intense fascination with highly disciplined meditative exercises, and no doubt thanks in part to the album’s well known producer Rick Rubin. Not everyone is fond of an everyman’s approach to emotional sincerity, and perhaps Rivers does treat this record a bit like a personal diary with guitar solos sometimes, but you won’t catch any obvious weird gimmicks like might be heard on a Beck album, and Beck essentially being an artist who says quite a lot without saying much of anything. Rivers is the other extreme, in saying quite a lot by saying rather little, but this editing, if you like, fits within the Pop realm nicely, and like it or not, on “Make Believe” Rivers and his understandably anonymous band mates have thoroughly done their home work.