Weezer
Why I like the blue album more than Pinkerton (I should be writing an American Studies Paper)
First, these are two of my favorite albums. I believe that these represent a peak in rock history something or other, as they are both really rock incredibly with easily identifiable emotion. I would choose the blue album over Pinkerton.
Cohesiveness. The blue album is cohesive to an insane degree. The whole album is colorcoded; every surface is blue, excepting the meaningless picture of the band on the front cover, as each member looks really regular. Just regular, that’s how to describe them. It is very cleanly laid out, with the same font the whole way, and I dig that stuff.
Each song sounds kind of similar – you know it’s from the same album – but at the same time feels like a different aspect of Weezer’s sound, depending on length, instrumentation and how they use instruments including acoustic versus electric, form, subject, length. And the whole album conveys a sense of longing, overall, that is just what I feel essential to Weezer.
The form of the album. The blue album is broken up, I feel, into three parts, marked very clearly by “Buddy Holly.” The first three songs fit nicely together. The next four songs is the singles area, including “Buddy Holly,” “Undone,” and “Say it Ain’t So.” “Surf Wax America” is stuck before “Say it Ain’t So,” but that works as “Say it Ain’t So”’s more subdued and dark feeling ends that section nicely. The last section is the “different” section. The last three songs begin with “In the Garage,” which would fit in the first section of the album, but works here as it does not focus as much on love as on one’s place in society, so it varies in content. The next two songs vary more from the rest of the album’s sound. “Holiday” has an upbeat, anthemic feeling and is very major. And “Only In Dreams” expands over a lengthy solo/building section, which is a perfect ending to the album, just blowing up the longing feeling expressed during the entire album.
Pinkerton fairs worse in these categories in my opinion. I love how both albums are a well-rounded ten tracks. But Pinkerton is broken up into two sections: the first and last five tracks. “Across the Sea” ends the first section, feeling wise, quite similarly to the blue album. Then “The Good Life” just starts the album over, as it has the same sound and lyrical focus, excessive sex, as the beginning of the album, “Tired of Sex.” I don’t like this restarting feeling, and I definitely don’t identify with being famous and having too much sex.
While keeping up with the cohesiveness of the blue album, I feel Pinkerton varies much less than the blue album; it is so alike that it is almost bland. Of course, songs like “Why Bother?,” “Across the Sea,” and “Butterfly” vary a lot in tone, the rest of the songs are hard for me to tell apart from one another. If I get a riff from one of them stuck in my head, I have to make a conscious effort to go through the rest of the song in my head to hear the name of the song so I can remember what song it is. Each song on the blue album is very distinct and I do not have that problem.
A lot of people would argue that Pinkerton shows more emotion than the blue album. I definitely don’t agree with this notion, as I feel both albums show a huge array of emotions. Just because the tone and sounds on Pinkerton are much more rough edged, from the distortion on guitar to Rivers’ voice, does not make it more emotive than the blue album. Rivers’ sarcastic snarl on “My Name is Jonas,” his fake-smile-pleading on “No One Else,” the pathetic background vocals on “The World has turned and left me here,” his anti-corporate bossiness on “Surf Wax America,” all of “Only in Dreams”… I could go on but I won’t. And all of these are about feeling left out and longing for a love and a better place in society. Pinkerton, however, discusses a lot of things like fame, lesbians, Japanese girls… things I don’t really get.
While I adore the sounds of Pinkerton, from the nonstop energy of “Why Bother?” to the uncomfortable unhappiness of “Across the Sea,” I find the blue album to be a more satisfying and well done album. Now why can’t they just make another one?