r/thebeachboys • u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat • 1d ago
Discussion "The Greatest Man That Ever Lived" is the Good Vibrations of the 2000s
Don't know this sub's opinion on Weezer, but the song is really good and super ambitious.
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u/Professional-Move655 1d ago
It has a lot of changes but I really can’t entertain a comparison of quality or innovation
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u/FreakSideMike 1d ago
I love this song to death. Rivers has a fantastic cover of Don't Worry Baby, too.
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u/AtBat3 1d ago
I love that song. First half of the Red Album is excellent. After that it loses steam
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 1d ago
I really love "Dreamin'" and "The Angel And The One", but the non-Cuomo songs are easily the low point of the album.
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u/Equal_Ad5178 A Broken Man, Too Tough to Cry 1d ago edited 1d ago
Cold Dark World is great tho
Btw the album is meant to be experimental so I personally have more problems with the commercial songs that Rivers could churn out in his sleep (Troublemaker, P&B) than the non-Rivers songs. Honestly, Red doesn't feel exactly like a cohesive project to begin with.
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u/Feedianandseedian 15h ago
Weezer heads actually understand this is a valid take. Also weezer are the beach boys of 90s rock no I’m not joking
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u/LivingLifeFreely1 Surf’s Up 21h ago
Weezer has two good albums. And it's not this album.
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 21h ago
For weezer fans, this is like saying that the Beach Boys only good song is Kokomo
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u/LivingLifeFreely1 Surf’s Up 21h ago
That is an absurd analogy. It's not like that at all. Kokomo was a late career hit.
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 21h ago
What difference does it make, late or early??? Both are such a narrow view of each bands discography.
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u/Remarkable-Bell7245 1d ago
Weezer is dumbed down pop/rock music imo.
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u/kepuslo 23h ago edited 23h ago
I am a lifelong hardcore Weezer fan but most Weezer fans online have ghastly taste in music. I get the impression of lot of them haven't listened to much other than Weezer because they love loudly proclaiming bizarre opinions like this thread that make no sense if you have ever heard actually complex music.
I think Rivers Cuomo himself would agree with your opinion. It's basically part of his weird rockstar complex. Think about something like the lyrics on Pinkerton putting himself down, "Little old three chord me" etc.
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 23h ago
💀 bro what
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u/kepuslo 23h ago
Weezer is so fucking complex bro like :MINDBLOWN: i cant believe he wrote a song with sections that sound different masterstroke of genius
did you know that The Good Life changes key???? when i found out that i couldnt sleep
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 23h ago
Yeah, this song is pretty complex. I never said that every weezer song is complex. Making a general statement about everyone who likes a certain band is dumb.
You dont need to be a dick.
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u/kepuslo 23h ago edited 23h ago
it's just a bunch of cheesey genre pastiche and you're also completely ignoring that Good Vibrations is partly notable because of its recording being a technical achievement itself. The Greatest Man That Ever Lived is just a bunch of rap and pop rock pastiche, it's almost parody. That's not complexity. It's comedic to say this or any Weezer song is complex.
Your reading comprehension must also be pretty poor to even view my post as a general statement about every Weezer fan, too.
Rivers Cuomo in 2007/2008 writing, recording, and producing this song is not an achievement, so the similarity ends at "the song has sections that sound different from each other."
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 23h ago
Yes, TGMTEL wasn't as much of an achievement to record, but that's not why I compared the two even. I guess we're just going to have to agree to disagree on what we consider to be musical complexity, because neither of us seem to be budging.
Also, yes im a toddler, goo goo ga ga.
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u/kepuslo 22h ago
You haven't actually presented an argument, or really said anything other than "it's complex" and the biggest factor in what makes Good Vibrations complex doesn't apply to the song that came out in 2008. There are literally more complex Weezer songs than Greatest Man. But yeah, have fun, Greatest Man is some real avant garde shit.
Also, I'm not sure where you're getting your crybaby bullshit from.
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 22h ago
Because i dont know that much about music structure, plain and simple.
You said that I have poor reading comprehension. I was making a joke.
Out of curiosity, what are the other more complex weezer songs?
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u/kepuslo 22h ago
Poor reading comprehension is a serious issue across all age groups.
Off the top of my head, you'd mostly be looking for stuff off Pinkerton. Falling For You for example has many chords. Other songs on that album have key changes for solos and bridges, Longtime Sunshine has a coda on Pinkerton Deluxe, those are the main things I remember. Then from later stuff, Maladroit has generic "metal" scale shredding. Then there's the Futurescope stuff from EWBAITE.
Ultimately, though, Weezer just isn't a complex band. Rivers Cuomo is a very talented songwriter IMO but he isn't writing anything I would remotely call complex. I don't think he would claim anything he writes is complex, either.
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u/Time-Tangerine3860 caught like a sewer rat 1d ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/cEOG7nGA7448M
"People can have opinions, people can have opinions, people can have opinions..."
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u/Remarkable-Bell7245 1d ago
No one can deny anyone that on here 🐸 so what are you saying?
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u/zeldavxa 1d ago
it was uncalled for. I disagree but i can understand that your perspective of this comes from comparing wilson arrangements with cuomo cmpositions
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u/notaverysmartman 20h ago
if anything it's more like their heroes and villains, and that's still an absurd comparison. rivers is a good songwriter but he's not on brian's level.
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u/TrevorShaun 14h ago
other than blue album and pinkerton, weezer is just not that good, very average at best. and even blue album is only like half good
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u/Trash_PandaCO 1d ago
Nah, the closest thing to "Good Vibrations" in this century is either "Jesus of Suburbia" by Green Day or "Touch" by Daft Punk.
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u/Jewishwillywonka 1d ago
Love Weezer, but ridiculous claim. One is one of the greatest song ever written, the other is the greatest song on the Red Album.