Rivers Cuomo gets outshined on his own song by Karly Hartzman

The Weezer rainbow is expanding for the first time since 2019’s The Black Album. Not that Rivers Cuomo and co haven’t been busy since then—they dropped Van Weezer and OK Human back in 2021 and their SZNZ EP quadriptych in 2022, and even had a recent sleeper hit when their 2015 track “Go Away” (featuring Best Coast) went viral on TikTok earlier this year. But today, the band announced The Gold Album, which boasts production credits from Klas Åhlund and Kenneth Blume (FKA Kenny Beats). 

The lead single, “We Might As Well Be Strangers” is a duet with Wednesday’s Karly Hartzman—whose grunge deadpan sounds more suited to the track’s Pinkerton-callback guitar tone. If a countrygaze queen like Hartzman has proven herself the rightful heir to the feedback-stacked angst-jangle that skyrocketed Weezer to stardom in the mid-Nineties, then Cuomo sounds as though he’s outgrown it. There’s no doubt that the man can still write a killer hook, but Hartzman’s vocal delivery gels so well with the track’s instrumental that her guest spot outshines its supposed protagonist, highlighting how desperate Cuomo is to recapture the magic of his grunge-pop glory days. He’ll keep digging through his bag of gimmicks until the rainbow runs out. Watch the video for “We Might As Well Be Strangers” below.

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