Monday, April 22, 2019

Review: Weezer's 'Dusty Gems and Raw Nuggets'


With a roster that included Liz Phair’s Whip Smart, Grant Lee Buffalo’s Mighty Joe Moon, Guided by Voices’ Bee Thousand, Pavement’s Crooked Rain/Crooked Rain, and The Cardigans’ Emmerdale, 1994 may have been the best year for rock and pop since the sixties. Yet those “alternative” albums didn’t yield much in the way of smash singles. Weezer was a very notable exception from the Class of ’94; the rare band to make terrific, organic pop and be rewarded with a several hits singles. Ace of Base may have ruled the airwaves, but everyone still went around whistling “Undone—The Sweater Song” and “Buddy Holly” (and into 1995, “Say It Ain’t So”). With infectious stuff like “My Name Is Jonas”, “The World Has Turned and Left Me Here”, “Surf Wax America”, and “In the Garage”, most of the rest of Weezer (aka: “The Blue Album”) could have made the grade as singles too. And Weezer’s excellent mid-nineties output didn’t even end there. On the B-sides and various artists comps was such A-material as the folky “Jamie”, the fifties-ish “Susanne”, the crushing “Mykel and Carli”, and the Stack-O-Vocals “My Evaline”. The band also managed to capture terrific live versions of more familiar stuff such as “My Name Is Jonas” and “Surf Wax America” on tape too.

Along with some spare demos (including a bizarre version of “Undone” that slows the tempo to a sloth’s pace and makes room for a bit of rapping and a Nirvana pastiche called “Paperface”), these stray tracks were compiled onto Dusty Gems and Raw Nuggets, the bonus disc of the deluxe edition of Weezer released to commemorate its tenth anniversary. Now on its 25th anniversary (we’re old!), Universal Music is giving Dusty Gems and Raw Nuggets its first vinyl release. Isolated from the album its supports, this disc is still very much worth a listen, and a real treat for fans of Weezer and fans of vinyl (I’m certain there’s a major overlap between those particular groups). The vinyl is marbled blue and limited to 4,000 units.

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