SZNZ: Spring (Glow in the Dark)

SZNZ: Spring appeared on the vernal equinox, a Sunday; it is the first of four EPs inspired by Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons that Weezer plan to release throughout the year. It’s a fitting gambit for Rivers Cuomo, and not only because The Four Seasons might be considered The Blue Album of Baroque music. The alt-rock icon who once invoked Stravinsky to justify returning to Harvard to learn computer science has always seen himself as a composer who happens to be a KISS fan. Cuomo has yet to go full Gesamtkunstwerk, but on SZNZ, he teases the collision of his opposing interests: After making his tribute to Pet Sounds with last year’s OK Human, why not make his own Der Ring des Nibelungen? Weezer have also found new life on TikTok; why not convert the zoomers to LARPing? Spring is the happy compromise, one that should be almost critic-proof: This is a beloved band with a multi-generational fanbase that’s down for anything Cuomo is selling, even out of morbid curiosity. Maybe Cuomo with elf ears and a creepy Easter bunny playing mandolin behind him are exactly what Weezer fans want now. So SZNZ: Spring may be the Weezer album we deserve, but not only is it not very good; it’s also not good in a way that’s new for Weezer.

On “Opening Night,” Cuomo interpolates the famous allegro melody of Vivaldi’s Concerto No. 1 in E major, Op. 8, RV 269, but that’s about the extent of the EP’s classical heft: Cuomo singing the first 10 seconds of “La primavera” and a clever Brian Bell guitar solo on “Opening Night” are the only Vivaldi we get on the entire EP. From there, it’s Weezer as usual, now playing more relaxed tempos and no songs about California. But whereas all the fun and loud riffs from last year’s Van Weezer were able to hide the usual Weezer lyrical speedbumps, there’s a new feeling of defrosting on Spring that leaves the band exposed; this might be the Weezer release with the least guitar distortion. Producers Jake Sinclair and Suzy Shinn are back from OK Human, now joined by Phoebe Bridgers collaborator (and John Williams’ grandson) Ethan Gruska, and it’s unclear if this group of professionals was tasked to make this defrosting to honor Vivaldi, or just to make the Shakespeare in this 51-year-old’s mind relatable to 14-year-olds.