Rock Music is the long awaited tribute to Weezer. It is out on Dead Droid Records.
I'm always reluctant to buy or listen to any sort of compilation, because they're always hit and miss. There will be a couple songs that you completely love, a few that you don't mind, and usually the rest are complete garbage. This is even more true for cover albums, because you want to see what certain bands have done to whatever songs they are covering, but you are waiting to cringe because you know at some point they will butcher a song - it's bound to happen. This is why I was extremely hesitant to listen to this particular album. It's a tribute album to Weezer, a band who I've grown to love over the years. Therefore, this falls under the compilation and cover album category, meaning the results could be catastrophic. I started to listen to this with optimism however, because to tell you the truth I have been looking forward to this release, and there are many bands on this tribute that I really enjoy. As I began to listen to this album, I just had to sit and scratch my head. I was trying to figure out the purpose of this whole tribute album, because I just wasn't getting it. Let me explain. Either the bands for the most part put out a carbon copy of the song, or they completely butchered the song. Only two songs stand out in my mind as good covers to great songs: Dashboard Confessional's cover of "Jamie" and Christopher John's cover of "The World Has Turned And Left Me Here." When you listen to these songs, you know that they are Weezer songs, but each person put something in it that was distinct to them and their band. Some other covers were decent, but weren't exactly up to par with the band's own material. Grade's cover of "Surf Wax America" left me disappointed because I know they are capable of doing a much better job, and the same goes with Further Seems Forever's cover of "Say It Ain't So." From the beginning of the song I thought it was going to be great, because they had a really nice piano intro. After the intro however, the song was for the most part exactly the same as Weezer's original version. The Stereo did a respectable cover of "El Scorcho", but The Impossible's and MyComplex completely ruined the songs they did.
If you want to listen to Weezer, go pick up a Weezer album. Because with this album you will hear bands copying Weezer, ruining their songs, and then a few good covers thrown in for good measure.
D+
