There’s an early run of three songs on this, Weezer’s eleventh studio album, titled Beach Boys, Feels Like Summer and Happy Hour. That gives you some idea of the escapist power-pop rush this album is aiming for, and it is achieved thanks to soaring falsetto choruses and insistent, upbeat grooves, while references to Stevie Ray Vaughan and Monty Python add to the sense of a band shamelessly wallowing in nostalgia in the same irresistible way they did on their 2014 stomper Back To The Shack.
The breeze-block FM rock riffs on Mexican Fender almost sound like a parody, but they work just as well now as they did for The Cars, Cheap Trick or any of Weezer’s musical antecedents. But it’s the ever-present hint of neurosis in Rivers Cuomo’s voice and vaguely bi-polar lyrics (thankfully not produced using the cut-up technique he employed for last year’s self-titled release) that give this band their perennial edge of strangeness, and reaffirm Weezer’s unique place in American rock fans’ affections.
