“Can’t Stop Partying,” Weezer’s collaboration with Jermaine Dupri, is essentially a litmus test for the entire new Weezer album, Raditude. With its flossy, Top 40 synths, Lil Wayne guest rap and Rivers Cuomo shout-outs to Patrón, pretty girls and his posse, it gives fair warning to Pinkerton fans increasingly disillusioned by Weezer’s new output that they won’t find anything but more pain here. And predictably, the Weezer faithful are horrified by the songthe comments on a YouTube leak of the track give a sense of how deeply betrayed they feel.
Yet as miserable as the track sounds on paper, “Can’t Stop Partying” actually works, at least for listeners not zealously averse to contemporary pop music. Jermaine Dupri’s ripping, big-budget groove outshines most of the Top 40 charts right now and, for that matter, just about anything LCD Soundsystem has ever concocted, and Wayne’s quickie verse lends the track a dark undertone. And then there’s Cuomo himself. Though it initially seems as if he’s again cast himself as the lackadaisical white guy wryly juxtaposed against hip-hop culturea contrast that wasn’t funny in the ’90s, and certainly wasn’t funny on the last couple Weezer albumsthe smugness and irony are gone this time.
Raditude celebrates contemporary pop music in its own language, the same way Weezer’s 1994 debut paid homage to classic power-pop. At times the album even draws a line between the two genres. Cuomo’s new songs about driving around, listening to cocky music and crushing on cute girls really aren’t all that different from Jonathan Richman’sCuomo just sometimes switches from the AM rock ’n’ roll station to his local Kiss affiliate.
Though it could be interpreted as a refutation of rockism, Raditude isn’t nearly as transgressive as Weezer’s last album, the red one. That was a bitter, sardonic record that subverted contemporary pop much like Destroyer does classic rock ’n’ roll, mashing it into a quixotic, trash-culture mess. Raditude is a far more traditional Weezer album, even with Jermaine Dupri collaboration and Cuomo’s continued obsession with hip-hop lingo. “Put Me Back Together” in particular may be the sweetest tune Cuomo’s penned since the Weezer new-millennium comeback, eschewing irony in favor of the earnest, raw sentiment that made the band so lovable in the ’90s. Similarly, Raditude’s fluffy lead single, “If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To,” is charming in its innocence, and even the miserable-sounding “I’m Your Daddy” atones for its vile title with an easy riff and big, candied hooks.
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Raditude might further tatter Weezer's standing among long-time fans, but its heart is in the right place. At the very least, it’s the first Weezer record since Cuomo’s makeover from bashful loner to bottle-popping party host that doesn’t feel like a cruel joke on its listeners.
