RyanCheley.com - Tag music

Weezer Live

I started college in 1996. In 1997 one of the most influential albums of my early adulthood was introduced to me ... Weezer's Pinkerton.

I hated it.

I wanted the Blue Album again but different somehow, and Pinkerton was NOT it.

However, a weird thing happened. Once I moved into my Sophomore apartment with a roommate that I can only describe as 'hard to live with' I retreeated into two things:

Final Fantasy VII
Music

Final Fantasy VII is a whole blog post on it's own, so I won't try to cover it here, but music ... and specifically Weezer were instrumental to me surviving my 'hard to live with' roommate.

Listening to too much Weezer

I probably listened to Pinkerton 1000 times (no exaggeration) over my time in college (this was not so hard because it's only a 35 minute album!)

I loved that album, and listening to it STILL brings me back to living in a small, shitty apartment in San Luis Obispo with a 'hard to live with' roommate.

I saw Weezer live in March of 2001 at RIMAC in La Jolla at UCSD¹. I still remember the show. Lots of hipster Weezer fans in their skinny jeans, nerd glasses, and a lot of earnestly trying really hard trying to not try to be 'cool'. I was (still am) a bigger guy that can't fit into Skinny jeans to save my life, so this wasn't really my scene, but I really wanted to see Weezer and I didn't want to care about the hipsters.

I also remember needing to be back in San Luis Obispo the next day for work or school or something. So after the show was done at midnight I got in my car and drove the roughly 4 hours back to San Luis Obsipo so I can do whatever I needed to do the 'next' day. It was a long day, but it was awesome. I got to see Weezer.

And for me, that's kind of where Weezer stopped making music. A few months later Weezer released the Green Album and I tried really hard to like it. I did that with Maladroit as well, but meh. Once Matt Sharp left it wasn't Weezer to me anymore².

Life has a way of happening while you're making other plans

After that life got in the way and my musical tastes changed ... but I still really liked the "real" Weezer.

One of the things I really liked doing with my daughter was driving her to her Dance class. We'd each pick an album we thought (hoped) the other would like and listen to it on the drive out.

Of course, I picked Pinkerton at one point and the Blue Album and she thought they were fine. Ugh, I guess fine is better than I don't like it, but still.

Fast forward to October 10th 2024 and Weezer is playing live, in an arena, not even 15 minutes from my house. I bought tickets for me and my daughter and it was pretty surreal. If you would have told me in 2001 at the Weezer concert that I'd see them again in 2024 with my adult daughter I wouldn't have believed you, but I would have thought it was a pretty cool dream to have 😄

The openers were Dinosaur Jr. and The Flaming Lips. I don't have much to say about Dinosaur Jr, but the Flaming Lips put on a great show. Lots of visual interest and excitement.

Then Weezer came on. And the show was amazing. Again, lots of great visuals and set design. One of my favorite was 'Island in the Sun' which had a Giant star in the background of a tropical looking island with a palm tree on it.

Again, the set design and visual aspects of the show were on point.

The only thing that wasn't great was the sound. If I listed to Pinkerton 1000 times, I listened to the Blue album at least 500 times. And the concert was meant to be a 30th anniversary of the Blue Album where they played it in order. And I have to say, for the first 5 - 10 seconds of each song I wasn't sure what song was being played ... it was a bit disappointing.

That being said, getting to see Weezer, with my daughter, was a pretty epic parenting level unlocked style achievement. I'm glad I got to go with her, even if the sounds was a bit muffled for my tastes.

Looking forward to the next concert!

now called Liontree Arena ↩︎
Yes, I've seen the SNL skit. Yes, I totally identify with Matt Damon's character! ↩︎

Posted by ryan on Tue 26 November 2024

An Evening with Post Modern Jukebox

About a month ago I discovered a kitschy band that did covers of current pop songs but re-imagined as Gatsbyesque versions. I was instantly in love with the new arrangements of these songs that I knew and the videos that they posted on YouTube. I loved it so much that I’ve been listening to them in Apple Music for a couple of weeks as well (time permitting).

I mentioned to Emily this new band that I found and she told me that they would be playing at the McCallum Theatre and I was in utter disbelief. We bought tickets that night (DD 113 and 114 ... some of the best in the house!) and we were all set.

To say that I’ve been looking forward to this concert is an understatement. For all the awesomeness that the YouTube videos have, I knew that a live performance would be a major event and I was not disappointed.

I think this is a concert that anyone could enjoy and that everyone should see. This was the first concert where I was both glad to be there AND glad that I had gone (usually I’m just glad that I have gone and have a hard time enjoying the moment while I’m there).

I have the set list below, mostly so I don’t forget what songs were played. It’s also really cool because some of the performers at the concert were the ones in the YouTube videos. Miche (pronounced Mickey) Braden was an amazingly soulful singer, and her part of ‘All about that Bass’ was on point and breath taking!

It was such an awesome concert. I can’t wait to see them again!