The new method isn’t for everyone. Bassist Scott Shriner says he prefers everyone be in the room together when recording. Ultimately, though, “whatever keeps Rivers the most productive and happy is best for all of us,” he says. The four band members recorded together for 2013’s Everything Will Be Alright in the End, but found it a struggle. “It was like nobody was really communicating,” Shriner recalls, “It’s not productive.” And plus, “if Rivers was in the room I’d probably have been like ‘Ah, I shouldn’t mess around with your part right there.’”
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That’s because, like Weezer’s classic first two albums, Daydream is a personal dispatch from Cuomo’s analytical and slightly paranoid mind. Its best songs cloak moments of melancholy in catchy massive pop hooks and earwormy guitars, and explore topics of romantic longing (“Mexican Fender”), aging (“Beach Boys”) and running on life’s endless hamster wheel (“Happy Hour”). “It had to transcend the darkness,” Cuomo says of the album. To that end, like last year’s self-titled LP (also known as their “White Album”) feel-good, summery vibes abound on Daydream, most notably the chant-along “La Mancha Screwjob.”
“There’s always a part of me that just loves super-joyous pop music,” Cuomo admits. “I just get so excited when ‘Call Me Maybe’ comes on.” He’d love to be an artist with a profound message, but “it’s hard for me to be divisive in a song.”
Weezer auditioned several producers before enlisting Walker. He’d previously worked with the band on 2009’s Raditude, but felt far more connected this time. “There was that melancholy inherent sadness that I love so much about Weezer,” Walker recalls of the acoustic guitar-and-vocal demos Cuomo sent him this summer. The producer pushed the band in bold new sonic directions: on “Beach Boys” Cuomo uses vocal effects for the first time; and “Sweet Mary” transformed from a typical Weezer guitar rocker into what Cuomo calls a “full-on Phil Spector, Pet Sounds” orchestral number with glockenspiel.
This fall, Weezer hit North American festivals and before heading to Europe in October. Cuomo promises “longer and more frequent world tours” on the horizon. Says the singer with a smile, “We’re just living the dream.”