I take what I said about MGMT. This song should be their single.
It has been the soundtrack to my brain for the past couple days. I think MGMT is brainwashing me to listen to Brian Eno. I found myself listening to Brian Eno album Here Come the Warm Jets yesterday and my head is a little clearer.
I love the jumpy, manic feel this song has and the weird key they play in (sounds all horror show). The song reminds me of a band from Peoria, Illinois called The Amazing Kill-o-Watts. I went through their back catalogue trying to find the song it reminded me of, but I was unsuccessful. Anyone from get the same feeling I do?
Dum Dum Girls feel like lofi-ed 60s pop rock with a hint of 90s girl-la-la twee. They have certainly have a sunny, summery feel, like the Jacuzzi Boys, although Dum Dum Girls come from the West coast. With the hot summer ramping up, this is the music I feel like walking to while sweat drips down the back of my neck.
This video has a washed out female Easy Rider feel with lofi video effects to match the song. My favorite part is the scene that looks like a clip from a French new wave film with subtitles. It gives smoking that sexy ennui before it become a dirty habit associated with sleazy car salesmen and cancer.
Oh how the mighty fall, well at least stumble. MGMT helped usher in a wave of good and not-so-good electro-pop. With a handful of singles, MGMT permeated pop culture in 2008-09. Kids and Time to Pretend showed up not only in every hipster's party mix, but in teen dramas like Gossip Girl, clothing store soundtracks, and commercials. French President Nicolas Sarkozy illegally puts Kids in some of his videos and played it at rallies and had to copyright infringement. (This happened as he was trying to pass a law to deny Internet access to file-sharers)
The point is that MGMT was one-hot-hit-making machine. Everyone was salivating for the next round of pop hits to accompany the kissing scene for their teen vampire show or sell their Bar-B-Que sauce or to play in the background to convince the young kids that they are still hip. But that didn't happen.
Instead, MGMT put out a record with no singles, no electro-pop, and nothing that sounds like the two songs that everyone knows. Ad-men and suburban teenagers everywhere moved on to tow-headed teen boys that sing like Stevie Wonder.
The record isn't bad at all. Congratulations isn't the wonder-child album that Oracular Spectacular is. It's much more rock and roll and pulls from old psych-pop and maybe some geek rock from the 80s.
The problem here is that MGMT is MGMT. If this record was released by an unknown group called MGNT or MGNR, the album would have been consumed in a completely different way. Congratulations is being panned for being inaccessible and pretentious, which may be true, but it is mainly being panned for not being Kids or Time to Pretend.
I want to talk about the video, but it is forgettable. The duo has shed their wild and colorful rag-tag outfits for tight jeans, Buddy Holly glasses, and plaid shits. For being a psych-pop song, this video is surprisingly strait-laced. Magical IKEA furniture that dispenses pink ice cream, contains a dollhouse and an angel ballerina sounds like it was dreamed up by a committee of the suburban teens that watch the vampire show. Oh I get it...it was all a dream. Yawn.
If you are bored you can count the excessive number of dashes I used to this post, I will send you a psychedelic unicorn that poops pink ice cream.
My roommate mentioned that the last I posted of Mazzy Star's Fade Into You looks very similar to this Alanis Morrissette and I agree. It has the same blown out look in a desert interspersed with slow, choppy video clips, but for a completely different effect. Rather than being slow and lonely, this video is harsh and angry.
I posted this video for several other reason. Sure, I love this song and the entire album, Jagged Little Pill. Alanis Morissette is a staple of the mid 90s and she helped paved the way for mildly confrontational female pop rock artists like Meredith Brooks in the 90s and Avril Lavigne in the 00s.
Another reason is that Alanis Morissette just got married a couple days ago to rapper Mario Treadway aka Souleye (not the Souleye from Sweden that does chiptune music).
Finally, this song is important because of who it is about. Alanis Morissette has claimed that song is about a specific person, but has never revealed who that person is, similar to the legend surrounding Carly Simon's You're So Vain. For over a decade, there have been rumors about who she was talking about, but now most people believe that it was Dave Coulier.
Yes, Uncle Joey from Full House is most likely who Alanis Morissette "went down on in a theater". To give you some context, here is Dave Coulier:
According to Snopes, the reason that they broke up is that Dave Coulier wanted to start a family but Alanis felt she was too young. At that point, Dave Coulier had already been married and divorced with a kid and I guess he wanted something serious. Well I guess Alanis won out in the end because now she has married and poor Uncle Joey has remained a bachelor.
As I mentioned in my last post, I Can Hardly Waitsounds very similar to Fade Into You. Mazzy Star is much cleaner and this song is in 3/4 as opposed to 4/4, but the music is very similar, even down to the slide guitar at the end of the song.
Mazzy Star had one hit, but they never really were a hit making type of band. Their music was slow, shoe-gazey, post-punk. I think they got lucky with Fade Into You, but the fame was well deserved. This song is a darkly beautiful ballad that exemplifies one wave of alternative music in the mid-nineties. I still get shivers listening to Hope Sandoval's haunting wail.
The video is also visual time capsule of music videos from that era that were heavily influenced byGus van Sant's music video for Red Hot Chili Peppers. The shots of band loosely arranged performing together are interspersed with shots of driving, landscapes, and random things treated with some film effect. The washed out look was also very popular (see Alanis Morrisette's You Oughta Know).
Beyond that, I just love the feel of the video. It does what a good video should do, echo the feelings of the song. The video has a lonely, melancholy feel that is accentuated by the shots of the wide empty desert and the bright overpowering sun.
In my news feed on Monday, Gawker claimed to have found Barack Obama in the music video. Here is a snapshot that is taken from about 1:02.
I don't think anyone at Gawker actually believed that it was true, but as for the rest of America I am not sure. If you believe that Barack Obama is a secret muslim that was born in Kenya, I guess you can believe that Barack Obama was a secret rapper that did MTV videos. It won't be long before we will see this picture with a Hitler mustache on a sign at the next Tea Party rally.
Well Gawker has finally debunked the coincidence by simply asking Cecil Glenn aka DC the Brain Supreme and Steve Gibson aka Steve Roll'n of Tag Team. So no, it isn't Barack Obama and the woman at 0:47 is not Michelle Obama.
As for the video and the song, they are classics. The song has been a staple of sports events, cheerleading dances, and wedding DJ's for over a decade. The video feels like it was taken from a night scene on MTV Spring Break. Its the Who Let the Dogs Out of the 90s, but we have enough distance now to not be annoyed.
On this blog, I usually post music videos that are innovative or interesting or have some cultural relevance, good or bad. Most of the time, when I come across video that doesn't really need much mention, I just move on. There is such a huge array of good videos out there that I don't really need to post the countless bad or mediocre videos I see. So, as you may have guessed, I am not so thrilled with this video.
Neon Indian has been hot stuff for the past year, in part thanks to a Best New Music endorsement from the music blog elite guard at Pitchfork.com. The other reason is that Alan Palomo, the man at the heart of Neon Indian, is talented and put out a great record. I loved Neon Indian's Psychic Chasm and the entire lofi, throwback synth sound. I am also partial to music from Denton, Texas. (Please release another album Chris Flemmons from the Baptist Generals. There has been over seven years of talking about a new album and my heart can't take it anymore.)
I came upon this video a couple days ago with the headline, "Neon Indian makes first ‘official’ music video", on some blog that seems to be a instruction manual on what to like if you want to be a hipster. My first thought was, wait, I thought I have already seen a couple Neon Indian videos, but I guess they weren't official. My second thought was, fantastic, I can't wait to see the first official Neon Indian video.
After the first viewing, I thought, oh well, on to the next video. But instead of moving on, I investigated a bit. I watched the "Making of" video for the music video:
From the first 20 seconds of this video I realized something was wrong. Alan Palomo subtly rolls his eyes and says, "especially when it gets to be something so collaborative, it becomes something bigger than the sum of its parts." And then I not-so-subtly rolled my eyes. Who are you collaborating with Alan Palomo? Then we meet the two obviously very artistic directors as they vaguely describe their inspiration that seems to have been cleverly lifted from the title of the song. You see, the song is called Sleep Paralysist and so the brilliant directors wanted Alan Palomo to "walk through all these crazy scenarios" and "animate sleep paralySIS" (with emphasis on the SIS, in case you didn't catch the the title of the song is Sleep Paralysist).
So Alan Palomo goes through all these crazy scenarios like throwing plates against a wall, a white horse, masks that were stolen from the set of Eyes Wide Shut, a pile of wooden folding chairs, a game of backgammon, and lots of creepy smoke from a smoke machine. You know, like the crazy stuff scenarios you see in your dreams. How do they come up with this stuff? Don't get too freaked out.
Ok, enough with the sarcasm. This video is a boring and uncreative mishmash of unrelated random and cliched images. The video takes place in some weird house with a bunch of crazy rooms, but the video only touches on one or two rooms and a zoom shot of the outside. The description and footage of this house in the "Making of" video is more interesting than anything in the actual music video.
How do you shoot a video in such a interesting place and barely shoot anything interesting. Why even shoot there? It seems that someone with a chunk money rented the house, a white horse, and a smoke machine and just started filming. Since this video is "so collaborative," who else are you collaborating with Alan Palomo?
Then I check to find out who this Green Label Sound record label is that is hosting all these videos. Oh, its Mountain Dew. What??? Mountain Dew? Oh I am sorry Mtn Dew. I guess that is easier to tweet when you want to vote for your favorite high fructose corn syrup infused artificially flavored drink in PepsiCo Inc.'s DEWmocracy. Perhaps they should also let me vote on my favorite high fructose corn syrup infused artificially flavored music video.
Look, I am not saying that nothing good can come from a label run by an multinational corporation whose goal is to sell you overpriced sugar water. I am sure millions of PepsiCo dollars have gone to treacle-sweet acts like NSync and Christina Aguilera, but Neon Indian? There is a place for mindless commercial pop music, but I hard pressed to categorize Neon Indian as commercial pop for the masses. In don't know, maybe that is what Alan Palomo is going for with this video, covering it up with a vaguely artsy veneer. Maybe he wants to be the next pop superstar, but he isn't going to do it with this video.
To end on a happy note, I am going to do something else I don't usually do. I am going to post a fan made music video. The first time I saw this video, I just assumed it was official and it is too bad that it isn't. This video looks to be shot on a handheld digital pocket camera (watch at minute 1:07) by some kids on a vacation to Chicago. These kids made a much better video for the song than the crap that the MTN_DEW laxative has helped Alan Palomo and the directing team at Focus Creeps to poop out. Good job SaintEcho7.
Last month, Kesha was on SNL and performed the song you see above in full neon body paint under a blacklight and it is amazing. The giant keytar in the background is also amazing.
The music video just came out this week and features clips of Kesha in the neon body paint. It also features a hallucinogenic desert scene that is an obvious homage to the Beatles' Yellow Submarine. The first half of the video is kind of boring, but the second half is great. I am not sure why they didn't do the animation throughout. Maybe to match the fact that the verses of the song are kind of boring but the chorus is rockin.
Here is a clip from Beatles' Yellow Submarine so you get what I mean.
I don't normally do this, but I am going to have two days of Ke$ha.
Today I am posting Kesha's biggest song Tik Tok along the the amazing Simpsons intro-parody and tomorrow I will post the new Your Love is My Drug video with the SNL body-paint performance.
I am not exactly sure who Kesha with a dollar sign is supposed to be. There are elements of vapid pop star, bold pop art, music industry superficiality, and feminist expression. Kesha is caught somewhere between Lady Gaga, Peaches, and Christina Aguilera. The first time I heard Kesha was on NPR, the second time was on Saturday Night Live, and the third time was on a ground breaking episode of the Simpsons where they changed the song and the opening sequence to parody of a Kesha video.
The Simpsons and Saturday Night Live are two of the gatekeepers of pop culture and Kesha broke through in less than a year. Kesha may not be doing anything as controversial as Lady Gaga or Peaches, but she is changing the face of pop music in ways we won't really see for years to come.
Kesha doesn't seem to be another auto-tuned, corporate music tool, but that is where she got her start. She got hired on by major pop producer Dr. Luke because of a demo tape of songs she wrote. She did backup vocals and music video appearances for best of the worst: Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, Katy Perry, and Flo Rida. But beyond being Barbie filler, she has also co-written several songs.
Kesha was getting some exposure, but it was Tik Tok that changed everything. Tik Tok got noticed on MySpace and the record company started pushing it. It was released as a single and reached top ten status in several countries. In the US, it has broke into mainstream.
The Simpsons have had the same theme song intro for nearly 20 years. This season they aired the a pardoy of the Tik Tok video with Lisa playing the part of Kesha, supported by loads of secondary characters. It not only boosts the status of Kesha, but also boosts the relavancy of the Simpsons.
Sci-fi Music Videos Week, Day 5, Styx - Mr. Roboto
Intro film
Mr Roboto
Mr. Roboto is part of a concept album released by Styx called Kilroy was Here. The concept is explained in the short film that goes with Mr. Roboto. Its truly amazing and you should watch it first. Styx used to start every show with the 10 minute film.
The story line is that the world has been taken over by a group called the Majority for Music Morality, who aren't concerned with money or power, just making sure no one can listen to rock and roll. The authoritarian powers imprison not political agitators but rock stars. This has to be the best scifi music project ever. Also robots walk around cursing in Japanese (I guess Japan became a superpower because they build the best robots?).
The music video for Mr. Roboto picks up where the film leaves off. Dennis Deyoung plays Kilroy, the imprisoned rock star who kills a robot and takes his suit to escape. He escapes to find the rock and roll dissident Jonathan Chance so that they can bring down the anti-rock government together. Mr. Roboto is about Kilroy's search for Chance and then the unveiling as he reveals he is not a robot.
Oh and I am not sure what "the modren man" is, but I know he likes to wear purple.
Sci-fi Music Videos Week, Day 5, 2pac - California Love
Part 1 - Beyond Beyond Thunderdome
Part 2 - Tiki Torch Dance Party
Both of these videos are California Love. The first is the original release and the second is a remix, but the first video has a to be continued ending that leads into the second, but videos have little else in common.
The first is an homage to the 80s post-apocalyptic classic Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome starring Tina Turner and everyone's favorite anti-semite Mel Gibson. This video also has some star appearances. In the beginning you will see pre-Rush HourChris Tucker and the godfather of funk, George Clinton. Then, dance party in the Thunderdome! Its pretty unique for a rap video. The second is your standard dance party rap video.
California Love is one of the best rap dance songs of the 90s and easily the most famous 2pac song. The song came out and went to the top of charts, but it was while 2pac was still in prison for a sexual assault charge. When he got out, 2pac was at the height of his career.
However, the mid 90s was not a good time for musicians at the height of their career. Only a couple months after Kurt Cobain of Nirvana died, 2pac was almost killed in an robbery in New York that has long been suspected to be part of an feud between East and West Coast rappers. 2pac survived, but two years later, months after Brad Newell of Sublime died, 2pac was shot again and this time he was killed. Many implicate Notorious B.I.G. along with other East Coast rappers like Sean "Puffy" "P. Diddy" "Puff Daddy" "Diddy" Combs in the shootings, nothing has ever been proven. A year later, when Notorious B.I.G. was on West Coast turf, he was gunned down and killed.
Now, its widely suspected that Death Row Records founder Shug Knight orchestrated the murders of both 2pac and Notorious B.I.G. Several cases have been brought against NYPD officers that worked for Shug Knight, but nothing has stuck.
Sci-fi Music Videos Week, Day 4, David Bowie - Space Oddity
Bowie is the grandfather of scifi inspired rock. Ever since Bowie's second album, Space Oddity, and the song with the same name, Bowie has had a scifi bent. The album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars is a concept album about an alien who is bringing the news of Earth's impending demise. Even though all of the songs have a scifi theme, none of the video follow the theme.
This video is great for several reasons. You get to see young Bowie, clean cut and crooked teeth. Space Oddity introduces the character Major Tom. Major Tom pops up in later songs, like Ashes to Ashes and in other artists songs, most notably the song Major Tom (Coming Home) by Peter Shilling.
In the video, Major Tom is floating around in space craft. You know it is Major Tom thanks to the giant name tag on his chest. Major Tom all of a sudden falls through space, but of course he is saved by two beautiful girls. They take him back to their space bed to spoon with Bowie.
You've probably never heard this version of Space Oddity before. This was the original version on the album. You are probably more familiar with this recording that came out with the release of the Aladdin Sane album.
Sci-fi Music Videos Week, Day 3, The Darkness - I Believe in a Thing Called Love
This video is campy 70s scifi goodness. A David Bowie-like singer circa-Ziggy Stardust sings in falsetto while battling a tentacle monster with his laser guitar. What more could you want?
This song is The Darkness's one hit. Its fun, sounds like Queen, and gets stuck in your head.
Lazer Crystal is a trio from Chicago doing this new fangled electro/synth/pop stuff fueled by the resurrection of 80s electronic music. But they are more than just band playing old Roland Juno's on tape machines. The music sounds like a moog having sex with drum machine in the alley behind a video game arcade. The video looks like an Apple ][ getting high with a VCR in Andy Worhol's basement.
Lazer Crystal is more 80s than the 80s. This video is an excellent example their hyperreal 80s-ness. I am pretty sure the glorification of the 80s is intentional. This song is from their album MCMLXXX, the roman numerals for 1980. MCMLXXX is their first album, but a handful of the songs are from the EPs that came before. I love the song Hot Pink BMX and I play it everytime I DJ. Love Rhombus is a slower, gothier song. Check out their dancier stuff too.
Small Black (check out their blog) is a two-piece from Long Island who has been touring with Washed Out with a self-released EP that has been getting some hype. They have the lo-fi summery synth sound that is all the rage right now (see this Jacuzzi Boys video). There is something really peaceful about this song.
This video is a beautiful slice of the life of an aging surfer. The guy with the handlebar mustache is the lead singer's uncle Matt. Its reminds me a lot of Darren Aronofsky's stunning film The Wrestler from 2008. Its about a washed up professional wrestler who can't give up the professional that is killing him. Its the best film from 2008.
If you haven't seen the wrestler, you may have seen the 2009 movie that basically stole the script from the wrestler, inserted a country music singer, and gave the story a sappy, happy ending. That movie was called Crazy Heart. Well, this video is like a real-life version of the Wrestler or Crazy Heart, but doesn't rip-off either films. Its beautiful in its own way.
Believe it or not, but this group started as a black metal band called Skull. They were part of the Swedish metal scene and they reinvented themselves in early 2000. In order to set themselves apart from their roots and the rest of the Swedish grindcore bands, they chose the name Teddybears.
Cobrastyle has been around since 2004 and you have probably heard it somewhere. Its been in television shows, movies, advertisements, videogames, corporate shopping background music, and sports games in between clips of 2 Unlimited's Get Ready for This and Techtronic's Pump Up the Jam. It is one of the most recognized songs that you don't know who sings and you don't know the title.
Other than being inserted as the background of every form of mass entertainment, there is another reason that you recognize this song. Cobrastyle is the result of mixing several songs from 80s artists like Sugar Hill Gang and Fine Young Cannibals. Kid Rock refenences some of the same songs in his song Bawitaba. So even if its possible that you haven't heard this song, you have heard the songs that make up this song.
The video is a great commentary and on the excesses of rock and roll of the 80s. Its a documentary style Spinal Tap-esque video with giant teddy bear heads. Its funny with great references to famous rock and roll scandals. I also love that they are playing an Atari game that is 8-bit. (Atari is only 4-bit for those of you not nerdy enough to know.)
I now this post is sounding negative, but I am not anti-Cobrastyle. There is a reason that this song is so ubiquitous, its catchy and fun. Its a mix of styles and time periods. While there is a lot of 80s elements in this song and video, it doesn't sound or look like the 80s at all. Its unique in a familiar way.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers are a divisive band in rock. Like U2, they have a huge following with millions of fans and with An international following, they can pack a stadium in almost any country. However, as their careers have progressed, their music has become less and less interesting. Well, because they are so well-known, it is hard not to have an opinion about them, so they end up becoming a love/hate band.
No matter your opinion the the Chili Peppers, it is hard to deny that this earlier song is still good. And it hard not to like this video.
Gus van Sant, the director of Drugstore Cowboys and Good Will Hunting, also directed this video. It won Viewers Choice Best Video and Breakthrough Video at the MTV Music awards and deservedly so. There are so many great images in this video. Notably, the guitarist solemnly playing against a fake desert backdrop, Anthony Keidis walking around LA and interacting with peeple, and the final scene of Keidis running heedlessly toward the camera in slow motion while an atomic explosion expands in the background. This was a very influential video and traces of its impact can be seen all throughout the 90s.
I am still talking about this video.
The major critique of this video around the internet is the concerning the graphic sex and raw violence, but the shock scenes are not glamorous. If the director wanted to make an indelible mark on the viewer, he had to startle the view with the stark consequence of xenophobia and racism.
The problem with sex and violence is that it can be glorified. The director made the right choice by making the sex and the violence to ugly to glorify. The sex scene is dirty, frightening and humiliating, with two particularly unnappealing naked people.
The violence is uncomfortable. The most vivid scene portrays an officer shooting a child in the head. There is nothing to glorify in this scene. Even a fan of ultra-violence will feel uneasy watching a child get shot. The sex and violence really punctuates the injustice without glorifying it.
This video is about xenophobia/racism and power. The video tries to illustrate in stark detail what happens when the state or the group in power uses xenophobia/racism to maintain power.
The result is that people the people in the in-group (the naked couple) and those outside of the group (the redheads) are dehumanized. The dehumanization allows the state to rationalize denying privacy and denying rights and enacting violence and murder and eventually genocide.
I am pretty sure the point of the video is to allow you to draw parallels to conflicts around the world. The conflicts between Hispanics and Blacks in the US and Muslims in Europe are less violent right now, but as xenophobia and racism grow, they can lead to situations that we see in Israel with Palastinians, with Kurds in the Middle East or with Tamils in MIA's own Sri Lanka. If conflict is not resolved, it leads to what we saw in Rwanda, Armenia, Bosnia, and the Holocaust.
This is one of the best music videos I have ever seen. It features police that look like US SWAT violently breaking into apartments looking for someone and some intense music. Initially, Universal Music Group pulled the video from YouTube, but after some shaming by M.I.A. and other groups, the video has been put back up. Watch it, all the way through.
M.I.A. is the most important musician in the world. Her music is fuel for revolution.
M.I.A. is Mathangi "Maya" Arulpragasam, the daughter of Tamil Tigers and a refugee from the Sri Lankan conflict. She grew up in London studying art and slowly made the move to music. After touring with Elastica and Peaches and even directing a music video for Elastica, M.I.A. recorded a 6-song tape with a 4-track, an MC-505, and a mic. One song on the tape, Galang got a couple remixes and eventually being a world underground club hit.
The song Paper Planes off of the second album Kala is what made M.I.A. an international sensation. The song is a mix of genres with a strong political message about life in the third world and immigration into the first world. In the last years of the 00s, you couldn't watch a movie with a socio-political message without hearing Paper Planes. You have heard it even if you don't know you have heard it.
I say that M.I.A. is the most important musician in the world because her appeal spans rap, electronic, dance, indie, and even mainstream pop. You can hear her all across the globe, in the richest and the poorest areas in the world. Her music is not about heartbreak and love or sex and drugs, its about war, violence, domination, and most important, struggle for freedom.
Rivers Cuomo wrote two of the greatest and most important albums of the 90's. Both albums fathered entire sub-genres. In 1994, Weezer's The Blue Album is a cornerstone of geek rock and it inspired countless nerdy high school garage bands and even some famous ones (see Ok Go). Two years later, Pinkerton was released, but wasn't well received. Rolling Stone called it one of the worst albums of 1996. However, as you well know, Rolling Stone was barely relevant in the 90's and isn't relevant at all in 2010. Pinkerton grew in popularity after 1996 and is one of the cornerstones of both Blue Sweater Emo and Eyeliner Emo.
Unfortunately, Rivers Cuomo took the rejection of his masterpiece pretty bad and Weezer stopped playing for nearly four years. As the early Internet was starting to explode, the online fan base was exploding with it. Armed with 14 new songs and minus Matt Sharp (bass player, founder of The Rentals), Weezer sold out several tours in 2000. With tons of hype and excited fans, they went to the studio to record their third album. They enlisted Ric Ocasek of the Cars, the producer of the Blue Album, to return and produce number three.
This is where the story goes sour. An exec from Geffen, their record label, came by to hear the songs and he didn't like them. So what did the band do? They moved to a new studio and Rivers wrote an album's worth of songs on the spot. Instead of recording meticulously crafted, interesting, heart-felt music as they once did, Weezer recorded 10 simple, formulaic, bland, lifeless songs for the Green Album.
And that was it. Weezer, one of the most important bands of the 90's, died, and in its place and empty space. --- Pink Triangle was a song on Pinkerton, but this video wasn't released until 2004. It was created by Karl Koch, the super roadie and band documentarian. He is a great guy. Back in 2000, me and some friends followed Weezer around the Midwest for three tours. I had been talking to Karl every night after the shows, he was an awesome guy. We didn't have tickets for a show in Columbia, Missouri and it was sold out. It looked like we weren't getting in, but then I bumped into Karl. He said we were lucky Weezer didn't have many friends in Missouri and he let us in as guests of the band. We got in before everyone else and stood right in the front. That was the best rock show I have seen.
