Thus Spoke Riverscuomo

I'd mentioned the mysterious allergy attack that has been polluting my chest and throat for the past week, so I'd planned to stay in today and catch up on all the little nooks & crannys of the english muffin that is music news. (Read it again; it makes sense, I promise.) I didn't expect, however, to happen across the news that The Rentals are getting back together.

Even creepier was that I was, in fact, listening to "Waiting," from 1995's Return Of The Rentals when I happened across this. For those of you that need a refresher, Weezer bassist Matt Sharp ran off in the mid 90s to start a pop band heavily laiden with keyboards and forefronted, fuzzy basslines. Or...how about this...if you're friends with P, well then you're friends with me. Ring a bell?

Thought so.

Finding more information on the Pitchfork news feed, I was particularly put on pause by this paragraph:

"[Sharp] added that his former Weezer bandmate, Rivers Cuomo, was especially influential. 'I think probably I saw Rivers less than a year ago, and he was really kind,' Sharp said. 'He's been one of the big people for me, who have been very supportive, going, "that's what you should be doing with your life"...in the sense of writing pop music again.'"

Well, well, well. I'll admit I'm not too over the phenomenon of 90s bands on a reunion-binge. I think I was too busy writing goth poetry and listening to Tori Amos in my adolescence to feel like any of these pop song and dances are ever really over. Nonetheless, Rivers...Mr. I heart Vipassana, am married but currently live in a Harvard dorm room, and wrote that song "Beverly Hills"...came through to tell Matt that really, instead of starting up a new project, he should resurrect the Rental's name from its peaceful, fairly legendary grave, and carry on with it.

Perhaps The Rentals was Matt Sharp's real moment in the spotlight, but this doesn't mean he shouldn't continue on while starting over. Aside from Sharp, the only other founding member to be part of the new Rentals round-up is Rachel Haden. Everyone else is new.

I'm TELLING you, in MY eyes, the PIXIES started doing this shit, and now EVERYONE is on it. Fine! Fine, fine fine! But GOD if you're going to reunite, do it right!

Reunion tour - (n.) when all founding members of a band get back together to (a) bring back old material to old fans or (b) bring back old material to fans that caught on after their initial break-up with the means of testing out even newer material. What responses from the audience this tour will provoke will often determine the possibility of there being a new record. (Note: re-releases DO NOT count).

But in all honesty, I'm not disappointed in the line-up. I have more faith in Matt than I ever did in Rivers (save the existence of the genius that is Pinkerton, and the fact that "Perfect Situation" is a great single), and anticipate the possibility of Boston being one of the main markets that they pass through on their small U.S. tour.

Endnote: If you do not own The Return Of The Rentals, I highly recommend getting a hold of it. Necessity for your record collection. If you're too lazy to go out to your record store, or you're also in Boston and are unwilling to go out into the monsoon of rain, click the album cover to buy the damn thing on Amazon for as low as a dollar-bloody-nineteen.



/rant