Fans of Weezer have been clamoring for news about the band's new studio album. Well, Buzznet has the goods: Guitarist Scott Shriner spoke with us on Wednesday, spilling deets about the group's self-titled release, "Pork and Beans" video and more.



Incidentally, just yesterday, Weezer moved up the record – which has come to be known as The Red Album, in light of the band's multiple self-titled discs – from a June 24 release to June 3. Eight of the songs recently leaked online, while the first single, "Pork and Beans," has been hugely successful so far: The song is Weezer's fastest-climbing yet on Modern Rock Radio, having reached #1 just 11 days after it reached the format.

"To me, it's just got a really interesting sound, right off the top," he told Buzznet about the red-hot single. "The words that [singer] Rivers [Cuomo] wrote just kind of draw you in. The clever way that he writes and then the chorus, to me, is just classic, killer Weezer. Big guitars ... edgy-sounding, classic Weezer rock. It's a great formula. ... It's taken it to another level of Weezer as well, without repeating the old. [The song] has captured the spirit of [Weezer], but taken it to another place."

In classic Weezer form, the band – which unforgettably spoofed a clip by '80s-metal band Grim Reaper and shot its "Beverly Hills" clip at Hugh Hefner's Playboy Mansion – took an innovative approach again with the video that's accompanying "Pork and Beans."

"The video is based on YouTube phenomenon, and we really took it to a whole 'nother level," Shriner divulged. "We brought a bunch of YouTube celebrities into L.A. and shot a video with them, and it was really insane and surreal. I'm pretty excited about it. I'm not a huge YouTube guy, but even to someone who's not that interested in YouTube, it's still a really interesting video. It's gonna be a trip."

The YouTube angle is especially fitting in light of Cuomo's obvious obsession with the site. A couple of months ago, he launched a YouTube video series called "Let's Write a Sawng," in which he interacted with fans to teach them the art of penning tunes.

While fans haven't had the chance to feast their eyes on the video yet, many of them have seen the new album artwork, and probably have a few questions about it:



Turns out you're not actually looking at the members of Weezer above; they're the guys' alter egos.

"The cover for The Red Album was kind of ... a happy accident," Shriner said. "We had a whole 'nother set of photographs that we wanted to be [on] the cover and nothing that we were looking at ever matched up to what we felt that album sounded like and represents for us. Our art director got that photo [the official album cover], which originally was a fun photo. 'OK, everybody, go as your alter ego, and we'll take a kooky picture,' [he said.] He [the art director] put the red background behind that, and that's what felt like the strongest image that matched how we feel the album sounds."

Like the album cover, the album itself was very much a group effort. While many tend to assume that most Weezer material was scribed by Cuomo, Shriner insists that, "We all wrote music on the record. [Drummer] Pat [Wilson] and [guitarist] Brian [Bell] wrote songs, and we all sing lead vocals on songs and sing leads on different verses and choruses.

"This is truly like no other Weezer record," he added. "I know that The Blue Album had co-writing on it, but we've never had a record where there were other singers singing lead vocals and so many different instruments. This is gonna be a true experience for young and old."

Well, probably not too old. But more than just different voices and instruments, Shriner says there's a ton of variety on the record: " 'Hearts Song' lists all of [frontman] Rivers [Cuomo's] influences. 'Pork and Beans' is kind of a thumb at the record label a little bit. 'The Greatest Man That Ever Lived [(Variations on a Shaker Hymn)]' is Weezer's 'Bohemian Rhapsody' [Queen's classic tune]. 'Cold Dark World' is a song I co-wrote with Rivers. I wrote this kind of creepy music, and Rivers wrote these kind of happy, positive lyrics, but when you put it together, it made a super-creepy song which I'm really proud of. 'Dreamin' ' is in a classic songwriting form. 'Troublemaker' is another kickass, classic Weezer-sounding song, where we're trying to get in touch with that side of us, which I think we kind of lost on [2006's] Make Believe. That ... causing-trouble mentality."

There might have been even more variety on the effort, though, had Weezer decided to include all the songs they recorded for it. But that wasn't the case – four of the tunes were sloughed off and will instead be appearing on the deluxe edition, which will only be available digitally.

"We finished the album, and we listened back, and there's a lot of slow songs on this album, and it was a little bit heavy and a little bit of a drag to listen to," Shriner admitted. "That was with those songs on the deluxe version, and we figured out that we needed a couple of uptempo songs and we might want to lose a couple songs. Originally it was like an hour and five minute album without 'Pork and Beans' and 'Troublemaker,' and it was a totally different record. So those songs we're really proud of. We put a ton of work in the song 'King' that I sing lead vocals on. We probably played that song for three weeks straight to try to get it feeling right. 'Pig' was a real tough song for us to get, and 'Ms. Sweeney' is a song that we're super-proud of. It's one of my favorite Weezer songs ever, I'd have to say, but there were too many lower-tempo songs for the 10-song album."

As for Shriner's favorite Weezer album ever, he 'fessed up: "I'm gonna vote for Maladroit. I think it's one of the best Weezer albums cause we're really just doing whatever the eff we wanted to do. We weren't at all thinking about the label or singles. We included the fans in on it and were playing a bunch of demos for them and we took a bunch of their suggestions into consideration. That album's like a giant jam to me, and it sounds sick to me. I really dig it."

With any luck, fans will be digging The Red Album just as much when it drops in a few weeks.