Rivers Cuomo

Rivers Cuomo continues to mine demo material on the second Alone volume, which includes another helping of tunes from Weezer's "lost" Songs From the Black Hole and a mixed bag of warbled home-recorded scraps. The Black Hole tunes -- "Oh Jonas," "Please Remember" and "Come to My Pod" -- are fairly scrawny, outshined by stand-alone pop songs like "Walt Disney" and "I Don't Want to Let You Go." For superfans, the distorted, euphoric cover of the Beach Boys' "Don't Worry Baby" is a cool trip into one of the songwriter's biggest musical influences.

In the notes to Alone II, Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo says he identifies with Brian
Wilson's self-doubt. So it's fitting that the highlight of his second home-demos set is a
soaring power-pop cover of "Don't Worry Baby." Other tracks — from the joyful "The
Prettiest Girl in the Whole Wide World" to the anxiety ode "My Brain Is Working Overtime" —
feel slightly undercooked. But they offer an intimate look at Cuomo's songwritin... More >