Weezer Performs at Madison Square Garden – NYC - 9/24/08

The crowd was buzzing last night as the last song fizzled out from the speakers of Angels and Airwaves and the vertical light stands made you feel you were in the Millennium Falcon, traveling through hyperspace. Afterwards, as the stagehands worked on adjusting the sound systems and tuning up the instruments, Weezer fans trickled in and out of the stands. Most of the fan regalia sported a red t-shirt that read “weezer” in white lettering, advertising their newest record. The fans were mostly in their early twenties, enjoying the cool fall air in NYC.

As Cats Stevens’ “Father and Son” started to fade out, the lights went down and the crowd started to rumble. As the silhouette of the band members came onto the stage the crowd roared. Then as unexpected as a mosquito bite in the wintertime, we heard the notes to “My Name is Jonas” and the noise level was raised a few levels.

This song is the very first track from their very first album, Weezer (the blue album). The song immediately flooded my thoughts of the early nineties when the original album came out. And has made a resurgence since being a track in Guitar Hero III (of which, my sister can play the song perfectly on medium level…and she wouldn’t know who Weezer was if she was serving them drinks). The band came out in pure white jump suits. Lead guitarist Rivers Cuomo hopped around, bouncing off the other members in the band and seemed to be pumped up to be in NYC.

Coming into the fourth song, another hit from the blue album “Say It Aint So”, Cuomo called out lead singer of Angels and Airwaves, Tom Delonge to sing along with him. Even though Delonge seemed to know the lyrics verbatim, he looked a little awkward prancing on stage without his guitar. Band members of Weezer switched instruments for this track and it was a nice display of how talented these musicians are.

The band played a lot of tracks from their newer albums. The crowd seemed to respond most notably when the older songs were sung. Songs like “Keep Fishin’”, “Perfect Situation”, and “Dope Nose” got the loudest ovation.

Coming into last night’s concert, I was hoping to hear some new stuff from their newest record, The Red Album. Unfortunately most of those songs were not to my liking. The only song that seemed to get through was a song called “Troublemaker”. The other songs seemed to be more geared to hip-hop style of fast talking lyrics and a bouncy sound. They worked a couple of songs with a person on synthesizer. I am hoping that this doesn’t mean they are trying to copy the sound style of Death Cab for Cutie and the like. Although those bands have produced great music, Weezer used to have its own distinctive sound, although that seems to have been lost over the last few albums.

The band did a great cover of Oasis’ “Whats the Story Morning Glory”. It was wasted however, due to the fact that most of the people there were 9 when that song came out. As an encore, the band brought out about 30 NYC fans who all had their own, various instruments. I was told that this was part of a contest that was going on. It was all very nice to see the 30 young men and women up on stage with the band playing “Island in the Sun” but I felt like throwing up in my mouth. It was a sad display of a band that is so talented, do an encore that is supposed to be for the fans that came to hear the songs that have gripped each of us in so many different ways throughout the past 16 years. Leaving at that very moment seemed better than listening to the new Weezer Pre-ejaculation band and dealing with the massive crowd, half of which were drunk off two beers. At least I didn’t have to endure “Beverly Hills”, although maybe the rendition with the 12 year olds may have been more credible.