In the weeks prior to the release of rock quartet
Weezer's
fourth album,
Maladroit, up until the completion of their 5th album
Make Believe, the band demoed over 200 songs for possible use on their fifth album. This is a detailed account of this large amount of unreleased, and mostly unheard material.
The First Wave of Sessions aka The Scrapped Stuff People Actually Heard
Weeks prior to Maladroit's releases the band was already prepping a fifth album. A number of sessions took place between March 2002 and July 2002 in which the band would get into a studio, blitz through 20+ songs a day and in the process self-produced and recorded a couple dozen songs that could have easily made up the fifth Weezer album.
The sessions were made up of many new songs, some songs that Rivers Cuomo had wrote but never got along to giving a good recording, as well as "Yellow Camaro", written by Brian Bell and "The Story is Wrong" and "Reason To Worry", which were written and sung by drummer Pat Wilson.
The band also played a single session with a fifth temporary member, Ryan Maynes whom added a new unique keyboard sound for the band. Maynes, better known as Shmedley as the bassist for the L.A rock outfit Arlo, played on a good amount of the demos and later played piano on a record for Brian's band The Space Twins.
Yet, eventually, the band decided to scrap every single song that formulated from these 2002 sessions for reasons not fully known. It's assumed they were just unsatisfied and wanted to move on. Although some of these songs, notably Prodigy Lover, contiuned to be demoed.
On July 3rd, 2002 in one of my favorite days in Weezer history, Karl Koch, weezer.com webmaster and all round great guy, released 23 unmixed, unmastered yet fantastic raw recordings consisting of many of the Album V sessions that never formulated. They were other releases at other times, but this was by far the biggest.
Listed are the Weezer.com released songs:
367
Acapulco
Booby Trap
Everybody Wants a Chance to Feel All Alone
Fontana
Hey Domingo
I Don't Want Your Lovin'
Little Songs
Lullaby
Mad Kow
Mansion of Cardboard
Misstep
Mo' Beats
Modern Dukes
Private Message
Prodigy Lover
Queen of Earth
Reason to Worry
Running Man
Sacrifice
She Who is Militant
Superstar
The Organ Player
The Story is Wrong
The Victor
Untenable
Yellow Camaro
The Second Wave of Sessions aka The Stuff That Either Made the Album, Or Nobody Ever Heard
Yet they were other scrapped demos for Weezer's fifth album that were demoed, yet still have not been heard. These songs were recorded at either Rivers' home or at S.I.R. Rehearsal Studios in L.A with a particular session at the house longtime friend of Weezer, Rod Cervera. The demos were either done by Rivers alone, the band, or at times when Brian or Pat couldn't make it, replacement members. Such as Josh Freese (drummer for The Vandals and A Perfect Circle and an established musician on his own). Yet when Rivers wanted to continue rehearsals but the rest of weezer wasnt in L.A, he held a couple sessions working on songs with 3/4ths of the Canadian pop/rock band Sloan, band members who had played with Pete Yorn (who once toured with =w=), and bluegrass musician Todd Sullivan, who played with Rivers and co. in the 1998 Goat Punishment shows.
Most of these songs were first demoed in 2002 and throughout 2003, after the songs listed above had mostly all been scrapped. Like the earlier songs, some of these were written by other members of Weezer.
Brian Bell wrote "Ugly Days", "Give It Up", “My Haircut Needs a Change,” “You Should Of Thought Of That,” “We Belong In Each Others Arms,” “Patterns of Love,” “Lost In The Translation,” “It’s So Easy,” “The Rat Race," and "Pretty Mama."
Patrick Wilson not only wrote "Can't Stop Loving", "Myself", “Ghosttown Life,” “Pure Sap,” “Sun Off The Sea,” “What Goes On,” “Talk About Your Feelings,” “You’ve Been Taken,” "Today Tomorrow and Yesterday" and "Wasted" but demoed them solo for use with Weezer. However, some songs it isn't clear if Rivers wrote them but wanted Brian to sing them, or if Brian wrote them and wanted Rivers to sing them.
The still unheard abandoned Album V demos are as follows:
Another Lover
Attention Deficit Disorder
Baby Relax
Baby Come Back
Blowin’ My Stack
Bus Stop
Can’t Stop Loving
Cold Glass of Water
Come Back To Me
Climbing Clean Riff
Cloudy Day
Clearer Eyes
Dead Man's Float
Do You Love Me (title could be different)
Drama Queen
Don't You Let My Heart Down
Egg Beaters
Emotion
E Tu Brute
Everybody Let's Rock
Fourth of July
Frozen Tears
Flown Away
Furthest of Seas
Garbage Can
Ghosttown Life
Give It Up
Give Me An Answer (possibly also known as “Yahoo”)
Heart of the Past
History's Child
Hold On
Hold On To My Loving
Hyde - King of Earth(I wonder if there's a connection with this an Queen of Earth?)
I Don't Want You
I Was Scared
I Can Love
I Need An Answer
In The End
Its Only Love
Its So Easy
Keep It Safe
Kings of Money(Assumed to be a retooled version of “Prodigy Lover”)
Let Me Go
Let Go Of Me
Lets Get Married
Love is the Reason
Love is the Answer(a brief clip can be heard on "The Making of Make Believe" on the disc's CD-ROM features)
Looking For a Fight
Lost in The Translation
Mama’s Song
Memories
Mr. Mastermind
Myself
My Life is My Life
My Heartcut Needs a Change
Only Just This Once
On My Own
Patterns of Love
Perfect Body
Pretty Mama
Pull on the Trigger
Pure Sap
Relax
Riff Jamb
Save Me
Save The Day
See You, Feel You
Steamroller Action
Story of My Life
Sugar Cookie
Sugar Daddies
Sun Off The Sea
Stand By My Side
Sweetest One of All
Talk About Your Feelings
Take Me Home
Today Tomorrow and Yesterday
This Is My Home
The Formula
The Message
The Rat Race
The Ruler's Back
The Heart of the Past
The Story
The Way You Used To
Turn Me Round (some apparently have this song, as it was played live once, but its a rare find)
Ugly Days
Wasted
We Belong In Each Others Arms
What Goes On
What’s Already Done
Why Oh Why
You Should Have Thought Of That
You’ve Been Taken
You're The One(a brief clip can be heard on "The Making of Make Believe" on the disc's CD-ROM features)
It's worth noting that since the media has cited Make Believe mentor/co-producer Rick Rubin working with "over 200" demos...it's quite possible these titles only scratch the surface of the material composed between 2002 and 2005.
Not all of the songs on the abandoned Album V demos are completely obscure tracks though. "Modern Dukes", "Mad Kow" and "Superstar" were heavily played during the first Weezer tour after the breakup (see, Weezer's Summer Songs of 2000 for more info). "The Story is Wrong" and "Yellow Camaro" were also played on their 2002 tour in Japan complete with Pat & Brian on vocals for their songs. "Modern Dukes" was unearthed from time to time in 2002, mostly on international dates. Different versions of "Little Songs" and "Mansion of Cardboard" were played on their October 24th, 2001 appearance on the HBO television show Reverb. The Space Twins, Brian Bell's side project to Weezer put a version of "Yellow Camaro" on their 2003 album End of Imagining. The third album by The Special Goodness, which is Patrick Wilson's side project features a number of abandoned album V demos, such as The Story is Wrong, Reason to Worry, Can't Stop Loving, Sun Off the Sea and What Goes On. The Weezer DVD, Video Capture Device, contains a video showing the band in the studio performing Prodigy Lover. Yet for the most part, the abandoned Album V demos have only been heard and appreciated by hardcore =w= fans with internet connections.
Personally, I think many of the songs were pretty fantastic and looked as if the band would have been pointing in a great new direction had the album been released. It had some tracks that were simple and almost jazzy with "Acapulco" and "Hey Domingo." Rivers took a rare stab at a story song with the melancoly number "The Organ Player." They had some real great stripped down songs such as "Everybody Wants a Chance To Feel All Alone." As well as some harder songs such as "Running Man", "Misstep" and the fan favorite "Mo' Beats." Two other fan favorites, "Prodigy Lover" and "Queen of Earth" are notable. The former is a universal fan favorite among the released demos which is about as great of a pop/rock song you can get now-a-days. The latter, "Queen of Earth," showed a beautifully dark and haunting side of the band that I hope they revisit someday.
I will never understand how Weezer has only released five albums combining about fifty songs when they've churned out hundreds and hundreds of unreleased tracks that are album worthy.