I'll Cut You: Malkmus Vs. Cuomo

Stephen Malkmus
Face the Truth (Matador)


Weezer
Make Believe (Geffen)

In my eyes, there is a world of nerdcore fandom. There are two kings in a power struggle for the loyalty of their legions. Sure there are Dukes and Lords across the land who think they can hang with the best of them, but c'mon, who are they kidding? It's between two (again, in my eyes): Stephen Malkmus and Rivers Cuomo.

After typing this out, the matchup seems so wrong. Though both Malkmus and Cuomo are both from dweeb central, not only did their bands sound completely different, they took different paths. Weezer hit the jackpot with their debut, put out the transcendent cult classic sophomore album, hibernated for winter (like 4 years or forever, which ever seems longer) then came back and took back the kingdom they had left behind in their reclusiveness. Pavement stumbled upon greatness, didn't care, made some awesome records sorta, got tired of it and decided to stop cuz they were bored of it.

In the debut of segment I'll Cut You (another in the series of segment titles that don't make sense)... Stephen Malkmus' Face the Truth goes up against Weezer's Make Believe. With Jonathan Richman as special guest referee!!!

Round 1: Oh the Irony!
Is it not fantastic that our two fighters are entitled Face the Truth and Make Believe? Malkmus and The Jicks (Joanna Bolme, John Moen, Mike Clark) seem to do the opposite of their title, as they have created the most Pavement-sounding record of the three Malkmus solo outings. In the other corner, Make Believe is just asking for a stern dissing. Weezer is trying to con you for one more go at a failed relationship. Yes, we were in love in the beginning, but when I caught you necking with my best friend and relying on awful metal riffs on Maladroit, I knew it was over. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. That's how it goes right? Round Recap: Cuomo stumbles on his own feet out of his corner. Malkmus shows off fancy old school moves, but facing in the wrong direction. He manages to connect accidentally in true Pavement style. Round to Malkmus.

Round 2: Ready to Rumble!
Finally the competition picks up. Malkmus comes out guns ablazing with "Pencil Rot", a devilishly synthy slacker rock number. He wails vintage Malkmus jibberish, while the keys blip and bleep dirty and haphazard with a flurry of tremendous fists of awesomeness. Cuomo counters with "Beverly Hills" the boxing equivalent of sticking an unprotected chin at arm's length. Cuomo's digs on the shallowest city is as misguided as his rapping. He's left so wide fucking open for the knock out. The song has everything you'd want to hate in song: a boring Joan Jett ripoff riff, aimless guitar noodling and again Cuomo's horrific rapping.

Malkmus brings more heaviness with some of the Sunset Nostalgia (the ultimate rock critic Pavement phrase, totally necessary for me to use), lulling opponents to sleep with "Freeze the Saints" and sending unconventional hooks right and left with quirky "Mama" and "Kindling for the Masters". He mixes masterfully with a dazzling array of old fashioned haymakers like "Post-Paint Boy" and "It Kills". There are a couple lapses of focus and missteps. "No More Shoes" is a noodling nightmare that reminded me of the worst parts of Pig Lib, while "Baby C'mon" is an uninspired boring ol' rock song (albeit with a coupla pretty tight ass guitar licks). C'mon Malkmus! You never once stuck to the game plan on Face the Truth, now is no time to start!

Fortunately for Malkmus, Cuomo has shaky knees after the first barrage. He throws up track after track, and his punches have no weight. What is this? A Cars rip off? No, wait, waaayyyyy worse, a Killers ripoff. As the songs blend together in mediocrity, Cuomo's already weak attack becomes vitually nonexistent, so much so that I don't care to name any more songs.

Round Recap: Malkmus KOs Cuomo to win round and match. End of blog.

Malkmus Triumphant! Weezer mires in the agony of defeat, a once great warrior now resigned to be a shadow of its former self.

Random notes: Fuck all you haters, yes, I like Stephen Malkmus (the eponymous debut) more than Pig Lib okay? It's poppy. Conventional, maybe. But let me remind you of the last time you wrote an album about rockets, pirates and Yul Brenner. Ahem, I thought so.

Stephen Malkmus is playing the Fillmore on 6/15/05 with Martha Wainwright. Weezer is playing the Warfield sometime, or its already happened. I don't even know, dude.

Stephen Malkmus: http://www.stephenmalkmus.com
Weezer: http://www.weezer.com