It’s not easy being green. The young upstarts of tWeezer, Baton Rouge’s resident Weezer fanatics, formed just prior to a torrent of releases–spearheaded by the so-called “Green Album”– from its nerd-rocker heroes, making it difficult to learn the band’s entire songbook. But that was then and this is now. tWeezer is celebrating its one-year anniversary and everyone is invited. The party begins at 11:30 p.m. at Rotolo’s in Tigerland after the LSU-Ole Miss football game.
“I don’t think any of us thought it was going to catch on at all,” lead singer Jonathan Pretus said. “We were all pretty surprised that it did, and that we’re around to celebrate a year later.”
Pretus says he and drummer Jeremy Miller toyed with the idea of a tWeezer cake or some stage pyrotechnics to celebrate on Saturday. Regardless, expect the unexpected from these New Orleans natives.
One of the challenges of being a cover band is balancing the well-known hits with more obscure numbers from the back catalogue.
“I was kind of bummed when the ‘Green Album’ came out because I was set on playing all the ‘Summer 2K’ stuff,” Miller said of Weezer’s unofficial Internet bootleg. “So we can’t really play them now, ’cause nobody knows them.”
In fact, Miller says people can and have gotten mad at tWeezer for not playing certain songs.
“We’ve got to play ‘Buddy Holly’ and ‘Say It Ain’t So,’ since those were such big songs,” Pretus said.
Though casual fans who just catch a glimpse of Kermit or a sumo wrestler from a music video may see Weezer’s style as consistent since its self-titled 1994 debut, Miller and Pretus hear the band’s progression. They attempt to mix the progression into the live shows.
“The first album wasn’t as personal. It was more accessible, and then ‘Pinkerton’ came out and it was all this depressed ‘girls hate me’ stuff,” Miller said.
“But from ‘Green Album’ on, it’s been more generic. So now songs are no longer about liking underage Japanese girls, its just about liking a girl,” Pretus added.
tWeezer is occasionally slighted by original bands in the area for playing covers, but when bar hoppers are crowd surfing at its first show, who can’t blame tWeezer for giving the people what they want.
Ironically the 1st Anniversary show coincides with a fundamental change for tWeezer. The band has written original material for a long time, but only recently set its sights on establishing an original band.
Pretus says he can chart easily the band’s songwriting progress by listening to an old demo tape.
“Jeremy and I stumbled across that [first] demo in my car a couple or weeks ago, and I thought ‘Oh my God, this is terrible.'” Pretus said. “There’s definitely been improvement.”
New guitarist Steve Turner, Pretus’ original pick for the band, recently joined after the departure of Joe Hanks. Pretus says Turner is talented as a lead guitarist which allows him to play rhythm and focus on his vocals.
Still, both Pretus and Miller hope their original band and tWeezer can coexist.
“We’ve gotten our foot in the door with tWeezer which I think is the perfect way to introduce the band we want to start doing,” Pretus said. “It’s just more gratifying to do your own music, but tWeezer can’t disappear completely.”