25 essential Weezer songs

Weezer’s cover of Toto’s enduring soft-rock classic “Africa” is perhaps the apex of the group’s symbiotic relationship with the internet. Late in 2017, a teenage Weezer fan launched an online campaign to get the band to cover “Africa,” a movement that swiftly expanded far beyond the group’s hardcore fans. Initially responding with a version of “Rosanna”—the smash Toto had just before “Africa”—Weezer did wind up cutting a rendition of the 1982 hit, a cover that gave the group their first number one Alternative Rock hit in a decade. While the genesis of the cover lies in a joke, the trick to Weezer’s “Africa” is that they played it straight: there’s never a sense the group is winking at their audience.

One of the highlights from the slightly overcooked Make Believe, “Perfect Situation” keeps the focus on Weezer’s eternal strengths: heavy guitars and heavy hooks in service of heavy self-loathing. The titular situation isn’t a sign of bliss: it refers to Cuomo mourning the relationship he let go down the drain. From a certain angle, the big melody and riffs can camouflage this anguish but they never quite erase it.

On the surface, “Getchoo” seems like a standard power pop song: the title appears to be a joking pun, Weezer shouts the chorus in unison, the hook is heavy and indelible. The execution, however, makes it clear that Rivers Cuomo is twisting these tropes, using them as a weapon against himself. “Getchoo” is as gnarled as it is catchy, making it one of the signature moments on Pinkerton.

“My Name Is Jonas” is the only song on Weezer’s 1994 debut to feature a co-writing credit by original member Jason Cropper, a guitarist who was fired by the band during the recording of the album. Cropper contributed the finger-picked acoustic guitar intro, a delicate sound that’s steamrolled by the rest of the band lurching into gear. Such whiplash transitions characterize the awkward stumble of “My Name Is Jonas,” a song where the lyrical empathy gets pummeled by the Weezer’s relentless attack—a combination that became one of the band’s signatures.

“Why Bother?” fits into a suite of songs on Pinkerton where Rivers Cuomo chooses to reject pursuing a personal connection all in fear that he’s going to hurt himself. Cuomo doesn’t sugarcoat his lyrics but his music is another matter entirely. Filled with insistent melodies, “Why Bother?” plays like a celebration, not self-loathing—a sleight of hand that gives the song its staying power.

One of the primary attributes of Weezer is that they’re thoroughly a Californian band, almost a hybrid between Van Halen, the Byrds, and Beach Boys. “Surf Wax America” is an early song that brings this character trait in sharp relief. A celebration of surf and sun, “Surf Wax America” has riffs that recall both Roger McGuinn and ’80s metal, all colored by harmonies that evoke the Beach Boys. The brightness of these pop turns overwhelms the dark turn the lyric takes: it leaves memories of the sun, not the undertow.

The closing number on Weezer’s 1994 debut album is unusual in how it spills out over the course of nearly eight minutes—a bonafide epic in the middle of sharply-honed pop tunes. That extended length allows the band to explore musical and emotional textures within the dreamy melodies and roiling riffs, discovering moments of melancholy and muscle that wound up pointing the way toward the dark, unvarnished textures of Pinkerton.

“The World Has Turned And Left Me Here” introduces one of the primary themes in River Cuomo’s songwriting: the sense that you’ve wound up out of step with your surroundings for reasons beyond your control. Cuomo’s plaintive delivery teases out the melancholy of his lyric while Weezer’s forceful execution gives the alienation urgency, suggesting there’s nothing more important than this overwhelming sense of loneliness.

Acting almost as a counterpoint to the furious “Dope Nose,” “Keep Fishin’” feels light and playful, even if it’s also buttressed by guitars that are every bit as heavy as anything else on Maladroit. The key is that drummer Patrick Wilson gives the song a nimble swing during its verses, lending a sense of levity that suits Weezer. The band accentuated their impishness in a video where they co-starred alongside the Muppets on the set of The Muppet Show.

The opening cut on Pinkerton, Weezer’s second album, made it clear that Rivers Cuomo didn’t find rock stardom all it’s cracked up to be. Over a cacophonic clatter that displays no small debt to Surfer Rosa, Cuomo laments how he doesn’t seem to be able to make love come true. Instead of sounding like a self-pitying rock star, he sounds racked with self-loathing, an emotion he winds up exploring in depth throughout Pinkerton.

Pinkerton’s collection of awkward sex, unrequited love and self-loathing reaches its apex on “Pink Triangle,” a song about Rivers Cuomo falling in love with a lesbian. Cuomo spends the song exploring his fantasies of marriage and ever-lasting love, arriving at the conclusion of “Everyone’s a little queer/Oh can’t she be a little straight?”—a line that shows he’s poking some fun at himself.

A pivotal number on Weezer’s debut, “In The Garage” underscores the geekiness of the band with its ode to KISS posters, Dungeon & Dragons, and X-Men. This den of nerddom is where Rivers Cuomo “feels safe,” and if the pop cultural touchstones are steeped in Gen-X signifiers, the essential emotions transcend generations.

A flipside of “Undone—The Sweater Song” that earned an audience by its inclusion on the closing credits to Kevin Smith’s Mallrats, “Susanne” is one of the purest pop songs in Weezer’s catalog. Filled with longing but lacking angst, it’s a pledge of devotion to a girl who is “all that I need in the world”—an emotion given weight by Weezer’s sweet harmony vocals.

Kicking off The Red Album with a big beat and crunching guitars, “Troublemaker” signals that Weezer seems loud and free after their Rick Rubin excursion on Make Believe. That pounding two-chord riff offers pure, dumb fun, while Rivers Cuomo plays with his words and delivery, giving “Troublemaker” a sense of playfulness that’s invigorating.

One of the biggest and slickest singles Weezer ever delivered, “Beverly Hills” tapped into the mid-2000s zeitgeist as it cynically celebrated all the plastic dreams enshrined by reality TV and the E! channel. The video’s setting at the Playboy Mansion makes this connection clear by featuring cameos from Hugh Hefner, Holly Madison, Bridget Marquardt, and Kendra Wilkinson—the stars of the Playboy reality show The Girls Next Door, which remarkably had yet to premiere by the time Weezer released the single. Heard apart from the video, “Beverly Hills” seems less aspirational, particularly with its up-from-the-bootstraps final verse, yet it still seems as if it was designed to be heard at backyard blowouts like the kind depicted in the video.

Bopping to a beat borrowed from the Jam’s “A Town Called Malice,” “(If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) To Want You To” is the purest blast of power-pop Weezer delivered during the 2000s. Dialing down the amplifiers and turning up the brightness to a point of saturation, Weezer sounds unusually giddy as they match their melody with a series of one-liners (“We watched Titanic and it didn’t make us sad”). The hooks and humor make this the great overlooked Weezer single.

“Hash Pipe” announced the return of Weezer after a five-year hiatus—a break that felt much longer due to Pinkerton’s underperformance on the charts. The monstrous rumble of “Hash Pipe” signaled that Weezer—and Rivers Cuomo in particular—were no longer bothering with navel-gazing: they were looking outward. As menacing as a shark, the circular minor-key riff provides the song with an undeniable propulsion, sending it crashing into a chorus that seems almost cathartic in context.

The hardest, heaviest single Weezer ever released, “Dope Nose” is a two-minute blast of bludgeoning riffs and melody. The brevity is the key to the song’s success. It comes on at full force, accelerated by shouted vocal hooks and gargantuan guitars, a blend that leaves a listener reeling upon the first listen… but it all happens so quickly, it begs for an immediate second spin.

The turning point on Pinkerton, “The Good Life” finds Rivers Cuomo finally deciding to shake off his doldrums and get back into the swing of life. His choice to not “be an old man anymore” is married to a ridiculously catchy guitar riff, resulting in the most joyous racket Weezer makes on the angst-ridden Pinkerton.

“Say It Ain’t So” occupies a curious emotional space as it careens from soft guitar hooks to angst-riddled vocal outbursts. That unsteadiness gives “Say It Ain’t So” a different tenor than “Undone—The Sweater Song,” another early Weezer classic that follows a similar quiet-loud-quiet pattern. Here, there’s an inherent uneasiness to Rivers Cuomo’s recounting of childhood memories, a sense of angst that gets resolved in the communal roar of Weezer.

Slithering to an off-kilter beat that recalls “El Scorcho,” “Pork And Beans” doesn’t simmer with the self-consciousness of that Pinkerton classic—something Rivers Cuomo makes plain on the chorus, when he sings he’s “fine and dandy with the me inside.” That self-affirmation is a bit of a riposte delivered to A&R execs who asked him to write a hit single for their sixth album. It’s possible to detect Cuomo bristling at that directive—there’s a line about collaborating with hitmaker Timbaland—but the remarkable thing about “Pork And Beans” is that it sounds simultaneously idiosyncratic and radio-ready.

Rivers Cuomo could hardly be called unsentimental but as a songwriter, he tends not to succumb to unadorned sweetness. “Island In The Sun” is a notable exception to this rule. As blissful and relaxed as its title suggests, “Island In The Sun” is an unrepentant love song. Nothing stands in the way of its inherent warmth; when the guitar amps are cranked, it’s not for might, it’s for texture. Such swelling of six-strings means “Island In The Sun” sounds like the work of Weezer, not a solo excursion from Cuomo, and helps give this mellow number a depth of color.

“Buddy Holly” isn’t about the trailblazing rock & roller, nor is it really about nostalgia, not even with a bunch of puns lifted from Rocky & Bullwinkle. It’s a song about two outsiders being united by being out of step together: the guy that looks like Buddy Holly and the girl that looks like Mary Tyler Moore being content to not be part of a scene filled with violence. That sense of righteous rebellion is girded by one of the catchiest melodies Rivers Cuomo ever wrote: this is the first sign that Weezer is a power-pop group for the ages.

Like “Undone—The Sweater Song,” “El Scorcho” lurches forward to an unsteady beat but where the subject of Weezer’s first single is rather elliptical, this lead single from Pinkerton is an outpouring of pop cultural ephemera and unrequited love. The two aren’t mutually exclusive: Rivers Cuomo loves that the object of his affection has never heard of Green Day, using it as an excuse to read her diary. Where some of Pinkerton cuts a bit close to the bone, “El Scorcho” is purposefully funny, a sign of the direction Weezer would take in their 2000s comeback.

A rare instance of a debut single capturing so much of the band’s essential personality, “Undone—The Sweater Song” spins familiar alt-rock elements into something that seems distinctly Weezer. The woozy, off-kilter opening riff, the chugging tension of the verse, the cathartic release of the chorus all have antecedents in alt-rock—it’s part Pixies, part Pavement at its core—but Weezer’s thudding riffs overlapping vocals convey a sense of camaraderie that helps turn Rivers Cuomo’s twitchy images of unraveling into something that unifies misfits instead of alienates them.