Alright, alright, I've had enough complaints. It's time
to hear what Rivers has got to say. And here I have a transcript of a live
interview conducted by a friend of a friend of a friends.
Q:Is Weezer really an old nickname of yours, or just some funny name? A:That is a name I came up with.
Q:Is there any special meaning to that? A:There is, but it would be impossible for me to explain it in a way thatanyone could understand. I'm sorry, I don't mean to be an asshole, butit's really to explain certain things so I don't even try.
Q:You could always lie. A:I'm not a good liar. The other guys are good at it but I suck at lying.
Q:Have you been to Thailand before? A:No, but Matt has. He was actually born there. For some reason his dad was there---I don't know what he was doing; it wasn't a military thing---but I think he was born in Bangkok.
Q:Has he been here since then? A:No. This will be the first time. So it's a homecoming concert, we'll call it that.
Q:I'm assuming you've been to Japan last fall. A:But nowhere else in the region. No But we're leaving tomorrow.
Q:So what are you thinking about it? A:I can't wait. 'Cause I'm crazy about Asian girls...Actually I was just hitting on the last girl I was talking to, "Jane".
A:I hope she's not your girlfriend.
A:No way!
A:I think, like, two days, It sucks 'cause it really is a business trip, not much time for fun.
A:I know why I decided to go there. I loving going to new places, new countries, and I love Asian girls. So I told our manager Hey, you've got to get us back to Asia and let's go to some new places; and I just kept begging him. It's defenitely something I've been wanting to do for a long time. Q:Why hasn't Pinkerton been as successful as the first album was? A:Well, because they didn't play it on the radio, ultimately. It's just amatter of taste I guess; the programme directors at a few key stationsdecided that it wasn't the happening thing. They're mostly playing ska orfemale vocalists, neither of which Weezer is. Q:Do you think it had something to do with the lyrics? A:Well, a few radio stations wouldn't play certain songs because they were racist or sexist or something like that, but the shows are still all sold out and our fans are more devout than ever. Q:Did you approach Pinkerton differently, purposely make it more challenging---sonically as well as lyrically? A:Well, we never meant the first record to sound as tame as it did. But it was our first time in the studio, we were nervous. We lost track of who we were and then we were all embarassed when we were done with it. I think the Pinkerton sound is pretty much what we've always sounded like live or on our demos and hopefully on our records to come. Q:Do you think Ric Ocasek's influence is what made it "tamer"? A:I don't want to put the blame on him. He pretty much let us do what wewanted to do. If we had insisted that we wantd to sound rawer it couldhave been that way. So I think we've got to take the responsibility. Ithink he definitely influenced the album in a way that would get it played on more radio stations, which is nice. skipped ahead to more interesting stuff....... Q:You said the album tells your story with "inner Pinkerton" What does that mean? A:Yeah, uh...It's so weird. I've told this same story a couple of times tonight and I told it to my date tonight and she's sitting right here so she has to here it again and I feel really bad but that's life. SO after we put out the first album I only slept with one groupie, and that waslike the first show on our first tour and I felt really guilty about it. It felt wrong. So for the next two years while we were huge rock stars andtouring around the world I didn't have any sex and I was reallyfrustrated. I took some time off and I was actually bed-ridden for a while from a leg injury, and after a while I realised that I was totally lonely and what I really wanted was to rock and have sex with different girlsevery night. So I wrote the songs on Pinkerton which are about mestruggling with that desire and finally accepting it now I'm finallyindulging it. Q:That's a great story. A:Yeah. The other thing is that the songs are in the order I wrote them, so you can here in the beginning I'm saying I'm tired of sex, I don't wantmeaningless sex anymore, I want to settle down and fall in love. And then towards the end of the album I'm saying I want to get back to the goodlife, et cetera. Q:Do you still feel guilty about that first groupie? A:No, I don't. And I don't feel guilty about all these other ones noweither. Because A) I drink a lot now, whereas before I didn't drink atall, and B) I'm really honest with everybody; I would tell a girl exactly how I am and what I do and I wouldn't lead them on into thinking that I'm in love with them and they're the only one for me. So ultimately they're responsible for their own actions if they want to get with me.
Q:Besides I'm sure she's fuckin' stoked now that she can tell her friends
about it. |