According to my incredibly reliable sources (wikipedia) We have Walmart to thank for the early release of Weezer's latest "If you're wondering if I want you to (I want you to)." Apparently the track was put up for sale on Walmart.com a week early by accident. Instead of freaking out, the folks over at Weez central decided to go with it (although official sales of the single won't be out until next week). So, if you haven't heard it yet... you're going to have to go to weezer.com, sorry they killed the youtube link... ***quick update, this track has been added to my player at the bottom!
My initial reaction was, "Wow this kind of sounds like the Violent Femmes," and although I still think that, I'm really enjoying IYTIWYT(IWYT). I would go as far as saying that I think this may be the best First Album Single since the Maladroit days. I honestly think IYTIWYT is better than both "Beverly Hills" and "Pork and Beans." Now don't get me wrong, I loved both of those tracks, especially the wahwah solo in "Beverly Hills" and the Pinkerton-est sound of "Pork and Beans," so musically this track may not be better, but lyrically I definitley think it is. It seems to fit right in line with Weezer's "glory days" (you know all that early stuff that some of you think is the only "true Weezer").
Along with this official first release, the boys over at Weez-town also gave us a taste of what other portions of the new album are going to sound like last month in Korea and Japan.
The first live track has already been heard by those of use who own Alone II, it's called "I Can't Stop Partying"
Next comes "I''m Your Daddy" and finally to finish things up, "Girl Got Hot" Unfortunately I can't embed either of these since they're not on Youtube. They are being broadcast from some site in Brazil, so if you go to googlevideo.com and search Weezer+the title of the song, you should be able to hear them no problem.
As stated above, I really liked "If You're Wondering..." The other three tracks are iffy, but then again all we have are live versions recorded with cellphones, so undoubltedly the studio versions will be much better, right? All are catchy, I'll give them that, but I'm not sure how I feel about the lyrics/subject matter...
The track "Girl Got Hot" really cracked me up (warning here comes a story from my life so you may want to close your laptop screen...). Several years ago (Pre-Green album), I was a young LDS missionary in Mozambique. I was working with another Elder Devin (Devok) Sheppard, who happened to be a fellow guitarist. While wondering the suburbs (huts) of Matola, we decided that upon returning to the U.S. we were going to start an awesome band called Optimus-Prime. Both being fans of Weezer (Blue and Pinkerton, since that is all that existed up to that point) we decided we wanted to be the band that when people described us, they'd say to their friends, "Optimus-Prime, you know, the guys who sound like Weezer, but aren't Weezer." (keep in mind, we both though Weezer was... well... dead) While in Moz. we wrote (well came up with lyrics at least) for several songs, one being entitled "Early Bloomer" which was about a guy who was really mean to this girl in elementary school/Jr. High because she liked him. Now many years later, he's doing everything he can to get her attention, but she won't give him the time of the day. It is strikningly similar to the subject of "Girl Got Hot."
The realization of the similarity between these two songs has brought me to two different conclusions, the first being all the similarities of my music which I wanted to sound like Weezer was purely coincidental. The second on the other hand, the one I like to believe is this, clearly I know where the band is headed, more so than they know themselves... Since we know that bassists are the most dispensible part of Weezer, it looks like Mr. Schriner (as much as we love you) has to go to make way for bassist #4. Yup, I'll be rockin' out stadiums with my trusty Thunderbird, booyah!
Just incase you're wondering what ever happened to these Optimus-Prime tracks. Most of them never saw the light of day, probably to the betterment of the music community. A few did make appearances in my band at BYUI, Smells Like A Girl (yes that was our name). They were re-worked by myself and Cory Brown. A handful of lucky... or un-lucky depending on your opinion, people heard variations of "Amnesia" "Early Bloomer" "Childhood Dream" "Another Stupid Girl" "Psycho-Ex" and possibly a few others. At various preformances (Sunrise 43 Living Room, Ward Tallent Show, Jamba Juice... yeah we were playing the big-time venues in Rexburg :)
-T
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