As Neil Young once said, it’s better to burn out than to fade away. And no, smartass, Kurt Cobain didn’t come up with that, so please refrain from snarky commentary. It’s actually a lyric from Young’s “Hey Hey, My My” that Kurt made more popular. Wikipedia it if you don’t believe me. No, seriously. Anyway, this expression is especially relevant to music. Some bands die off (figuratively and literally) before they start to suck, Cobain and Nirvana being one of them. Nick Drake and Elliott Smith are also good examples. And then there are the bands that drag their careers on and on and on and on like the squirrel you just ran over, just lying on the road all jittery and helpless and trying to twitch his way to the curb for relief, and even he knows he’s completely fucked by now, but God help him, he will go on and on even if he’s leaving a smear of entrails behind him. Kind of like Weezer.
Seriously, what the hell happened to Weezer? I put on some of their older stuff when I began to write this, and it is awesome. WHY DID THEY NOT QUIT WHEN THEY WERE AHEAD? The world would be a better place without Maladroit and all of Weezer’s subsequent albums, Raditude included. Their recent music is about as inspired as a milk-flavoured milkshake. On the bright side, nothing on Raditude blows as much as “Beverly Hills” or “We Are All On Drugs,” but damn, it gets precariously close. Some of these lyrics make Soulja Boy sound like Oscar Wilde. Here is an excerpt from the touching “The Girl Got Hot”: Knew this girl back in junior high school/When nobody gave her a look/Look at what we got, the girl got hot/Switched up and rewrote the book.
Hey, Rivers, are your feet wet? Because that was deep.
Then again, maybe I’m being a little too harsh. This album isn’t terrible. In fact, it’s pretty decent, I guess. But compared to the remainder of their body of work, this effort is weak. I blame the joint tour with Blink 182. You know the mighty have fallen when they’re touring with those assclowns. Anyway, I’m going to be beating a dead horse (or squirrel) if I continue to talk about how much Weezer sucks now, so I’m going to finish this off in point form.
• “I Want You To” is by far the best track. Coincidentally, it’s also the first one, so it only goes downhill from there.
• All the other tracks sound so similar that there isn’t a worst track.
• Can we discuss “I’m Your Daddy” for a minute? Okay? Thanks. In real life, if I was at a club and some dude came up to me to tell me that I’m his baby and he’s my daddy tonight, I would run. Fast. And I hate running, a lot. Also, I would ditch my drink because there’s a 2000% probability that this creeper just roofied it.
• I’m done now. I’m all out of wit. I give it a 5 out of 10, plus an extra .5 just because Rivers and I wear the same glasses. So. 5.5 it is. Let’s hope they do a 180 for their next album.
(5.5/10)
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