In 1996 Robert Nevin and I caught Weezer on the Pinkerton tour at Roseland. Expecting one of the best acts in rock, coming off a disastrously received by everybody but me (I was rapturous) sophomore effort, the place bottled into one of the most vicious moshpits it has ever been my misfortune to find myself in the middle of.
Robert wasn’t amused by the switch up between who they were on record and the hard rocking grunge in time only live show was hardly a shocker.
Pinkerton, however, was a shocker. Considered today the birth of emo, it was dismissed at the time.
The back story is amazing and I will try to keep it to the highlights.
1. The Blue albums was a smash.
2. Following the tour Cuomo decided to have an operation to lengthen his leg as one was shorter than the other.
3. It was very painful and Rivers wrote all the songs on a fretboard.
4. He was also drugged out on painkillers.
5. The initial idea was for a concept album based upon Madame Butterfly featuring songs he wrote before the Blue album.
6. Then he got accepted to Harvard.
And the rest of Pinkerton came together.
He blew off the concept though he remains on the last track (“Butterfly”) and the album name (a character from the opera).
What remains is 34 minutes of beauty, all this weird happenstance lead to one of the most wonderful musical experiences. Rivers never came close to this bizarre, troubled ruminations on love and sex again.
It opens with Rivers rejecting groupies with “Tired Of Sex” and moves soon through unrequited love of various forms, “Getchoo” speaks for itself, “No Other One” takes you to the other side of desire, “I never would, no I never could with one” and the suggestion of a fidelity so extreme it leads to impotence with any other girls is one of the most original things I’ve ever read.
So is “Across the Sea” a gorgeous, almost literal take on Rivers reaction to a fan letter from Japan: “I’ve got your letter, you’ve got my song”, he explains, as his desire, his mind, gallops along to the bridge, finally “I wonder how you touch yourself…”
The first 9 songs are hard rock of intense proportions, they are emo: extreme romanticism set to a rock format.
The last song is equal parts lovely and sad, “I have smell you on my hands for days, I can’t wash away your scent”.
Nearly 15 years later Pinkerton stand as a wonderful creation and with the exception of some of the Green album and tracks here and there, Rivers has failed to reach that deep inside himself again.