haha "another weird choice" to listen to? Shrug.
Boy this is one of those albums that I've heard so many times that I'm not sure how to really talk about it. On one hand, I consider it a totally classic 90's rock album. On the other, well I've heard it a million times so it doesn't really do the same thing to me that it did years ago. But there's no denying that these are good, solid, catchy songs anyway. It feels a bit stiff to me compared to the stream of albums that would follow though. But I mean there's still some really good stuff here. "Even Flow" is still grunge stadium rock that feels good. "Alive" still works that Melvins riff into something fairly epic. "Black" is still pretty haunting. It's a pretty great album that I just kind of feel like I've overplayed I guess. PS: Why was it called Ten? I don't think I remember the answer to that one.
Rock N Roll is mid-tier RA for me. It's certainly not close to Heartbreaker or Gold before it. That's for sure. But it is one of those RA albums that shows why I've been such an endearing fan. He loves doing these random concept albums. And this was his - you guessed it - RNR album. With "This Is It" being his answer to The Strokes. Or "So Alive" sounding like, I don't know, a U2 hit? It's a bit of a mixed bag, but it does rock as promised. At least in a very Strokes-y/Interpol-y way. It's good. Not always great, but always good-to-great. My favorite track is probably "Anybody Wanna Take Me Home?" which is just a fantastic closing time track along the lines of a less sad "Come Pick Me Up." Also "Note To Self: Don't Die" is pretty awesome in its own hilarious way.
Hurley is Weezer by numbers. It's Weezer on auto-pilot. It sounds like Weezer. The songs are kind of catchy. But not much would bring you back. If you were wondering, I guess this would be my least favorite Weezer album. I don't hate it. Far from hate it. But I'd probably listen to every other Weezer album before this one. "Memories" is kind of good I guess. But stuff like "Where's My Sex" - it just feels like a retread of old Weezer. Like they wanted to relive "Tired Of Sex" but flip it on its head. There's too much aimless rehash here to justify the album. The weird thing is the sore thumb here - "Hang On" which is just so so so much better than everything else on the album. Man. It's a bummer. You get to track 7 and you hear "Hang On" and it really hits you how kind of middle-of-the-road Hurley is because if the whole album sounded like "Hang On" then this album would have been great. I still need to hunt down the deluxe edition for that Coldplay cover though haha. No wait - I lied. This is still better than Make Believe. Yes this is mediocre but it at least still sounds like Weezer. Ugh. I'll talk about Make Believe another time. This is like a 3/5 though. It's good - at least for a huge Weezer fan.