Review Summary: Just as the title says.
For Weezer fans, the past 13 years have been pretty rough. 2001's
Green Album was supposed to be a triumphant return, but in the end it was little more than a soulless replication of their first album's geek rock aesthetic.
Maladroit was a huge step in the right direction, but it was still plagued by cringeworthy lyricism and some questionable musical choices. From
Make Believe onward things were only looking more and more grim, with only the occasional flash of brilliance giving hope to disillusioned former fans. To the outside viewer it looked like Rivers Cuomo had lost it, but he never actually did. His
Alone compilations proved that even in Weezer's dark ages he never actually forgot how to write a good tune, but instead kept making seriously questionable choices because he was going to do what he wanted, the fanbase be damned. That mentality is what brought us abominations like
Raditude, where Cuomo actually thought it would be a good idea to work with Dr. Luke, Jermaine Dupri and Lil Wayne on a fuggin' Weezer album. Over the past few years, however, there has been a notable shift in Cuomo's attitude towards his fanbase and his older works. The band did entire tours where they played
The Blue Album and
Pinkerton in their entirety, and their Weezer cruises provided an opportunity to have an intimate experience with fans and find out what they wanted from a Weezer album.
It isn't too surprising, then, that
Everything Will Be Alright In The End aims to emulate their 90s glory days. What is surprising is how damn good it is. When I first heard about
Everything Will Be Alright In The End, I was concerned that the band would approximate their early sound, but completely miss the raw emotion and genuineness. Fortunately, those concerns were not realized. By bringing back their 90s aesthetic and adding a modern indie pop spin on songs like "Go Away" and "I've Had It Up To Here," Cuomo has given us an album that can easily stand up to their first two releases. In fact, the highpoints here come dangerously close to rivaling those albums. The climax of "Cleopatra," the entirety of "Da Vinci" and "The British Are Coming" -
this is what we wanted from a Weezer record. Lead single "Back To The Shack" is pretty much the only pockmark here and it's still a damn good tune that works quite well as a mission statement, and would have easily been a highlight on
Hurley. The 7 minute closer "The Futurescape Trilogy" sees the band jamming, shredding and letting loose in a way that directly recalls the relative messiness of
Pinkerton. It's incredibly satisfying to hear a Weezer song like this, especially when their recent output has felt largely repressed and too clean and refined.
This is not
The Blue Album or
Pinkerton. It's not perfect nor is it even close. It is however, a welcome return to form that feels genuine and not soulless or manufactured, or clinically calculated to be "the perfect Weezer album." When listening to
Everything Will Be Alright In The End I felt an aching in my chest, a sense of warmth and satisfaction that I have not felt when listening to a Weezer album released after the year I was born. For those reasons it is an album well worth listening to.
