Riverpedia archive - 02/10/2021

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=Alone Series=
Alone IV - XIII are a series of demo bundles I’ve released in The Market. Each bundle represents a different era, and are grouped as outlined below.
* Alone IV: Before Weezer
* Alone V: The Blue-Pinkerton Years
* Alone VI: The Black Room
* Alone VII: The Green Years
* Alone VIII: The Maladroit Years
* Alone IX: The Make Believe Years
* Alone X: The Red-Raditude-Hurley Years
* Alone XI: The EWBAITE Years
* Alone XII: The White Years
====Track Lists====
Riverchatters are keeping up to date track lists for each bundle in this google sheet..Missing demos can be noted on page 2 of the google sheet. Be sure to note the song title and the era.
====Ratings====
My demos can be rated here. Thank you to gracz for creating and sharing his site while I finalize a native ranking system.
====Album Artwork====
Fans have created and shared their own album artwork for each bundle in a google drive, where you can view or download their concepts, and you can even upload your own work!
==Alone V: Pre-Weezer==
Alone V: Pre-Weezer starts when I was around 11, pretending to be a DJ in Connecticut on my home recorder and ends in 1992 just when I started to write songs for Weezer.
It took me a while to find my voice as a songwriter. I started off trying to write metal riffs. But by the time I moved to LA in 1989, the songwriting and types of music I was exploring really varied.
Before focusing on Weezer, I compiled a number of tapes with full songs, riffs, sketches and even mash-ups with phone calls. And there’s my ‘opera’ tape- 20 plus tracks with me at the piano. Some of these can be a little raw, but they’re a fun listen.
The music got grungy but eventually, I gained focus when I started to write songs specifically for Weezer. This bundle has the first demo for Undone (The Sweater Song) and a number of early Weezer songs that didn’t make The Blue Album.
===Highest-rated by curators:===
#Make Me a Pallet
#Christmas in LA
#Colmusheen
#Little Bag
#Anything 4 You (Take 3)
#I Can’t Forget the Way
#Close Your Eyes and Give Me a Kiss
#Spider Bitch
#Ain’t Got No Words
#Hey M’Darlin
===Highest-rated by neighbors:===
#I Can’t Forget the Way 2
#Hey M’Darlin
#Make Me a Pallet
#Christmas in LA
#Phone Call Interruption
#Wet Dog
#Undone
#Crazy Rock ‘n Rollers
#Hello Men and Boys
#Colmusheen
==Alone III & Alone IV: The Blue-Pinkerton Years==
Once Weezer was underway, I found my voice and a unique, true identity as a songwriter. This bundle starts when Weezer was still rocking the clubs in LA, when I wrote most of the songs that would end up on the Blue Album. You’ll probably find a lot of the songs in this collection familiar—there are the original demos of classic Weezer songs from Blue and Pinkerton, like In the Garage, Holiday or Why Bother?
After the release of our first album, we toured constantly and I at first, found it difficult to write. But I drew inspiration from my disillusionment with life on the road and used that for the concept behind Songs from the Black Hole.
I took a break from touring for leg surgery and to go back to school, where the space opera concept transformed into the ideas that would become Pinkerton.
Even though I put myself out there for Pinkerton, the personal lyrics and complex rock arrangements didn't resonate with audiences like I had hoped. During one of the European festivals we played before the album's release, I remember how the audience connected way more with a musical act that didn’t have guitars, a bass or drums than they did with us. The crowd was drawn to their simple sound with repetitive beats. I spent years trying to emulate that with my own music.
After we stopped touring in the summer of '97, I returned to Boston. But instead of resuming my classes at Harvard, I set out to make music that was the opposite of Pinkerton, a (repetitive sound) with impersonal lyrics. With groups of Boston musicians, I led two bands, one called Homie which played weird, country goofball songs written during Pinkerton, and another that I called Lovely, focused on the music I thought I would play in the future. Some of those songs, like Rosemary and American Girls, are part of the Blue-Pinkerton years because they were my response to the reception to Pinkerton and a hint of what was next.
===Highest Rated by Curators===
#Waiting on You
#In the Garage
#Rosemary
#Superman
#Punk Rock Girl
#Simply State
#Hot Tub
#Too Good For Me
#When You’re Near Me
#Let Me Wash At Your Sink
===Highest Rated by Neighbors===
#Waiting on You
#You Gave Your Love to Me Softly
#Devotion
#Susanne
#Holiday
#In the Garage
#American Girls
#Tired of Sex
#No One Else
#Why Bother 
==Alone VI: The Black Room==
I returned to LA in early 1998 determined to work on a new sound for Weezer's third album. The Black Room is a time where I was struggling to find confidence. I isolated myself and experimented with several different styles of music to find what was next.
I returned to T.K. Productions, where Weezer had its first rehearsal, rented a recording/rehearsal room and worked on various sketch tapes, many of which are in this bundle. The tapes are made up of songs and sketches, and my approach changed throughout the year. At first, I was convinced that Weezer's future lay in repetitive, impersonal yet romantic rock. Then I looked to Oasis for inspiration. By that summer, my inspiration changed to Nirvana and a more dissonant sound. But by the end of the year, I was unhappy with most of what I had done that whole year and decided to take drastic action.
Deciding that I needed to purge myself of all external influences, I cut off contact with the outside world. I painted the walls of my bedroom black, covered my windows and stopped watching TV. I wrote down every musical notion that I had and what type of environment or stimulus was behind it. All for the goal of creating a formula for the perfect pop-rock song. I called this the Catalog of Riffs, and used the numbering system for these songs for many years after.
A year and more than one hundred songs later, I moved out of my apartment to Beechwood Canyon and shared my efforts with my bandmates. There were some clear standouts, like My Brain, which would be the first 'new' Weezer song fans would hear, and Island In the Sun, which went on to be a hit on the Green Album.
Even though I would put this time behind me, the influence of the Black Room would continue to be strong in my songwriting. Songs like Pork and Beans (23 Wan and Wistful Silvertone Riff), Byzantine (TKX-21 There’s a Bomb in the Air) and Hash Pipe (TKX-55 Everybody Needs a Place to Rest) all have their roots in these songs and sketches.
===Highest Rated by Curators===
#French Pop
#TK-10 Girls’ Soccer
#Average Town
#TK-7 Sunshine
#Always
#The Black Rider
#Labrador
#Kilmanjaro
#I Hip
#I Want You
===Highest Rated by Neighbors===
#Good Times
#Sweet Love
#Suicide Pilot
#My Brain
#In The Night
#Rosemary
#I Wish You Luck
#Average Town
#TK-7 Sunshine
#TK-8 Stars Shine Bright (Goodnight)
==Alone VII: The Green Years==
I didn’t realize it at the time, but when Weezer got back together in early 2000, we had amassed a whole new set of fans who loved Pinkerton. Which was a different reception to the album than after its release. That spring, we received an offer to play a show in Japan which dwarfed any offer we had ever received for a concert. So Weezer was back on the road.
In the time between Pinkerton and that summer, I was trying to come up with the best system for writing songs. At the time, I didn’t have confidence in myself. And no matter the music I was making, I couldn’t find confidence in that either. I was dependent on my system (still using the Catalog of Riffs) and boosted by the writings of Nietzsche, Goethe and Stravinsky.
Weezer was in demand and we had to make a record. Looking back, I consider the album was made not necessarily through our talent, but more through sheer force of will. I decided to follow the example of “great” men cited by Nietzsche who pursued “world domination.” But for me, that was simply being active in the pursuit of commercial success.
After our tour ended in the fall of 2000, I was back home at my house in Beechwood Canyon where the band and I worked on the songs that would make up Weezer’s third album. Even as we rehearsed, I was still writing and recording new songs on my own. Some of these songs like My Best Friends are Gone (Brightening Day) and Teenage Victory Song would become B-sides for the Green Album. But I didn’t dwell on this time period for long. This phase ended in May of 2001 with the release of the Green Album. We achieved commercial success and I was determined to make the most of it.
===Highest Rated by Curators===
#You Stupid Piece of Shit
#I Wish You Luck
#Hole in Time
#Teenage Victory Song
#My Best Friends are Gone
#No Way
#Fanny Bone
#Gimme Something
#Possessed, Obsessed
#Let’s Get Mellow
===Highest Rated by Neighbors===
#Yer Fun to Play With
#I Wish You Luck
#Hide into the Sun
#Mr. Docksider
#Fanny Bone
#Suddenly I Shot My Mouth
#You Stupid Piece of Shit
#Tremendously Awful
#Pleased to Meet You (Annie, Come Home)
#My Best Friends are Gone
Further Reading:Ilizarov Procedure
( Last edited by King Tom at February 10, 2021 2:43 AM ) 
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( Last edited by Tiffany at February 10, 2021 2:19 PM ) 
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