Weezer’s Best Albums: Ranked

In 1993, two groups were hard at work crafting something brand new to bring to the world. At Electric Lady Studios, Rivers Cuomo and company were recording the first singles off of their self-titled debut, Weezer, unknowingly preparing to take over the rock world in a few months with their nerdy guitar rock. In another studio, director Michael Bay and advertising agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners pulled together the first commercial for the California Milk Processor Board’s “Got Milk?” campaign that spawned decades of milk misinformation on behalf of the dairy lobby in America. The result of the masterful craft from both groups saw that the music of Weezer and the milk of cows were both heavily present in my upbringing. Now, I write to rank the output of both, and present a full discography ranking in addition to highlighting the best (chocolate) milks in the business on one list. To be clear, if a milk brand appears above a Weezer album, it implies that drinking a glass is more enjoyable than listening to that album.

20. Horizon Organic

Horizon Organic milk boxes were a staple of my school lunches. Where school provided milks adopted a stubbier look with a tilted sipping design, Horizon came packaged in a proud and tall box with a straw – for refined milk drinking. However, the brand betrayed its dedicated drinkers after a recipe change in the mid-2010s. The new recipe is akin to drinking Cocoa Pebbles runoff if you prepared a bowl of cereal with a bottle of Dasani from McDonald’s. After multiple callous Tweets at the brand’s social media intern, I have since been blocked, in the same way that the new recipe block’s people from happiness when they drink it.

19. Black Album (2019)

For years, fans were wishing for a “black” album. Why? I guess it’s a cool color. In hand with the fan excitement, Rivers hyped up the album for a few years beforehand and constantly teased the color’s use on an official color album (Make Believe has a black palette and the signature four-man photo cover, but is in fact NOT self-titled color album). After years of excitement around the release with an album rollout including a sunglasses collab (which I bought) and an exclusive location in Fortnite (which I played) the result was resoundingly disappointing and showed the consequences of Fitz and the Tantrums. What fans expected to be a return to the “dark” roots of Pinkerton turned into their poppiest release yet, with AJR-like beats, dubstep elements, and Rivers rapping. “California Snow” has crept onto set lists on recent tours, but otherwise the songs are largely forgettable and irredeemable, and define the absolute lowest of the band’s output.

18. Make Believe (2005)

Following a three year break after their fourth studio album, Make Believe marked the band’s dip into pop rock delirium. With shallow lyrics and radio-chasing riffs, the band does achieve its main goal of outputting hits through “Beverly Hills” – the band’s worst song (and frustratingly one of the most popular). “Perfect Situation” follows a similar vein, though with a funny insert Y/N fanfic music video to go with it.

17. Raditude (2009)

“I Want You To” opens up the album on a high note, but listeners probably wish the song closed the album too. As in the rest of the album doesn’t exist. The dog is funny though.

16. Nesquik

Powdery garbage, the mix in Nesquik powder only starts to taste like chocolate after you brew a supersaturated solution with 20 spoonfuls in Heisenberg’s RV. The bottled variants of the brand aren’t much better, found in every gas station in the continental US. Nesquik as a product feels like it was made for kids, by kids, in the way that kids are really bad at everything. I hate the bunny too.

15. Pacific Daydream (2017)

Weezer’s follow up to the White Album came just a year after with Pacific Daydream, and I wish Rivers gave himself another few months. Back to the pop-heavy sound, the album’s only standout is “Feels Like Summer” which had DC101 and Alt Nation in a chokehold that year. There aren’t many reasons to return to Pacific Daydream for a re-listen outside of its lead single, so it’s best forgotten to the Weezer graveyard.

14. Hurley (2010)

Album art pulled from a picture of Rivers and Jorge Garcia with a CD box filter, named after his character on Lost, containing a cover of “Viva La Vida”. Why? Just… why? “Memories” is good, though.

13. Van Weezer (2021)

With Van Weezer, the band attempted to dive into nostalgic heavy metal sounds, drawing inspiration from Van Halen (who would’ve thought?). The result is an album filled with cheesy guitar solos and some of the worst lyrics I’ve ever heard (“Pump it up into me / Please daddy, please daddy” on Rivers’ song about battling addiction) that barely tries to reach the music it tries to emulate. Originally announced alongside the Hella Mega Tour with Green Day and Fall Out Boy, it’s clear that they wanted new songs to fill arenas, but none really ever sparked.

12. School Lunch Milk

The dairy lobby was at its strongest when they got every public school in America to offer sugar-filled milk with no dietary benefits to children instead of water. It’s like when Congress certified pizza as a vegetable (wait, same lobbyists?). The milk was as fake as the boards of education that forced it on us, always runny and at a weird temperature due to its storage in the lunch line. The worst part of course was using a foldable closure as the sipping vessel that elementary schoolers with zero motor skills couldn’t open and littered our beverage with fingery paper droppings, but hey I promise our local officials have only the best for our youth in mind (please vote out the entire Carroll County school board). These would’ve been great in a food fight, though. Definitely could concuss a hall monitor.

11. Red Album (2008)

Red feels like an album for dads, fit with corny puns and outlandish guitar solos. Two of the first three songs on the album are live show favorites, after that you can turn it off and listen to Taylor Swift’s Red.

10. Teal Album (2019)

What started as a Twitter meme led to a full blown cover album in the lead up to Van Weezer. I feel like this shouldn’t count on the list, but it is better than about half of their discography, with Rivers gender-bending “No Scrubs” leading the album over their memed “Africa” cover. I remember once eating at a diner somewhere in an odd state and the restaurant played this album from front to back. At first I thought it was just an 80s music station, but no, it was Weezer. Always Weezer.

9. Green Album (2001)

Green came after a five-year hiatus that saw bassist Matt Sharp leave the band, Rivers return to Harvard and then drop out again, and their music grow in critical and cult status unbeknownst to the band. Their comeback was resoundingly more lighthearted compared to their previous release, but this comes at expense to the album’s weight and substance. The band returns to Blue‘s formula with success – “Island In The Sun” remains their biggest hit to date – but lacks Rivers previous emotional transparency. Green is the start of a closed-off era for him and the band that focuses more on producing hits than producing art, but the results show that not many of the songs stick after twenty years.

8. Random Medium Bottles at Strange Stores with No Recognizable Brands

I can’t really explain this one. This chocolate milk isn’t from a certain brand or store. It’s just kind of there. Maybe you’re stopping for gas on a road trip and pick up a snack and a bev for the road. You’re in line for checkout and you fall for the fridge by the cash register scheme. The bottles are an awkward size, often filled with 2-3 servings that you plow through without realizing. There’s something uniquely American about this chocolate milk, just incredibly ambiguous and corporate, so far derived from the family of cows bred and imprisoned for our consumption. That spirit is present in the milk, though, as these are usually the thickest and chocolatiest to-go options out there, and cause stomach pains equal in power and magnitude to its splendor. But it’s a good pain. Kind of like listening to Weezer.

7. Maladroit (2002)

On to the good stuff. Released a day before the one-year anniversary of Green, Maladroit operates in the “hidden gem” zone of the band’s discography. The album became the new frame of reference to future releases for hardcore fans (“___ is the best album since Maladroit“). “Dope Nose” has become a fan favorite live song while the chorus-less “Burndt Jamb” features the absolute best guitar riff of any Weezer song. The album feels like a natural follow up to Pinkerton, but with Green‘s release less than a year before the album didn’t seem to land at the right time to connect with large audiences with the band still riding popularity from Green‘s lead singles.

6. OK Human (2021)

When COVID-19 hit, Weezer decided to delay the release of Van Weezer alongside postponing the Hella Mega Tour. In its place, the band released OK Human out of nowhere – a fully acoustic album recorded on all analogue equipment accompanied by a 38-piece orchestra. Playing off of Radiohead’s OK Computer, the album itself stands as Weezer’s own biggest left turn, producing a work that blends rock and classical through a flowing body of songs with no cuts. The album re-inspires human connections lost over quarantine through Baroque arrangements combined with classic Weezer riffs and humor. “All My Favorite Songs” defines the modern alternative music fan and shows Rivers at his truest (although cheesiest) for the first time in awhile. My theory is that he realized Van Weezer was hot garbage and called everyone back to the studio in hopes of recording some real bangers. If so, he succeeded.

5. Everything Will Be Alright In The End (2014)

EWBAITE promises and delivers on a return to the band’s roots. Rivers puts a hold on his pop leaning aspirations that developed over the last decade and returns with a slew of songs without corny flair in lyricism or composition. It listens as a self-referential farewell album with “Eulogy For A Rock Band” saying goodbye to themselves from a fans perspective, with references to many historical figures including Cleopatra, Da Vinci, and Paul Revere. Rivers puts out a doo-wop duet with Bethany Cosentino of Best Coast on “Go Away”, calling back to cut songs from the Pinkerton era with a sprinkle of Billy Joel flair. The album ends on a three part epic with some of their best instrumental arrangements up until OK Human. The only sour taste the album leaves is soon after Rivers invites us “Back To The Shack” he kicks us back to the Weezer wilderness of drooling tunes, the band’s nerd rock revival only lasting through a two album run.

4. Vintage Whole Foods Glass Bottle

Whole Foods is like if Trader Joe’s was an actual grocery store and not a snack-filled bodega. Before Amazon bought out the company and the liberal NIMBY’s started boasting the brand as their entire personality, the store was actually pretty good, and their early brilliance can be summed up in two products: two-bite brownies and glass milk bottles. Together a supreme combo in the Whole Foods heyday, but like most things, the golden era came to an end. Whether succumbing to health food trends or corporate greed, the recipes for both were changed, and don’t hold up today like they did before. What was once a full-bodied, smooth, and velvety delicacy is now a flat, watery sludge, a common trend in the milk world. Maybe its the nostalgia that blinds me in revering the old Whole Foods milk, but if I wasn’t burdened by nostalgia then I probably wouldn’t be a Weezer fan.

3. Blue Album (1994)

Read the full review and analysis here, but you should know the deal. It’s Blue. It’s perfect. It’s a top 5 debut album of all time. It’s a mastapiece. Why is it only third? Cause I feel like it. This website does not do numbers. My last post has 2 views. One was me because I always check to see how it loads on mobile after I publish. I don’t care. If for some reason you read this ranking and you’re mad that I didn’t put Blue first I encourage you to leave some hate and spread my links to clown me so that I can get my impressions and engagement up. Thank you.

2. White Album (2016)

Move over Paul MidCartney, John Lennmid, George Harrmidson, and Midgo Starr, the GOAT White Album is here. I still remember the morning this came out. I climbed down from the loft bed at 5:50ish to get ready for my morning commute to high school. It was a B-Day. I listened to it laying on the floor of my bathroom because I’d do this thing where I brought in a pillow and blanket and napped as the water in the shower heated up. It was the same bathroom where I found out Donald Trump was elected President over Hillary Clinton from a Hypebeast Instagram post. It was at the top of my feed. I later bought a bunch of clothes from Hypebeast’s storefront HBX and they were all garbage. I no longer follow Hypebeast.

The White Album feels like the product of our Blue hero that thought, “I’m a loser, life sucks,” in his youth then went and grew up, made some money, got laid, lived some experiences, and settled down in middle age and thought, “I’m a winner, life still sucks.” He did not undergo much personal growth but now has the maturity and authority to proclaim that life sucks, which I imagine Rivers did when he was cranking out these tunes. White is close to a shot-for-shot remake of Blue – ten songs, no skips, amazing guitar, one slightly misogynist track, and a slow burn finale that grows and billows into an explosive ending. White improved over Weezer’s debut by adding a “Damn, Daniel” reference, a heavenly bridge on “Jacked Up”, and an older feeling of solitude gleaned from living life, contrary to the solitude of Blue‘s teenage angst. Each song is incredibly catchy and infectious, like an album made up of ten “Buddy Holly”s. It begins and ends with sounds of a California beach, having picked us up, taken us on a sonic journey, and plopped us back at the start, where we now sit and wonder about what we learned, what was our purpose, why us? It is more impressive that the band has gone through multiple stretches of terrible releases only to casually drop a generational rock than if they just released Blue clones for the rest of their lives. More than anything, White proves that Weezer has still got it, which latches me to their new releases unlike any other band. Edging out the endless bummer.

1. Pinkerton (1996)

There are few albums that have more influence on 21st century indie and alternative rock than Pinkerton. Weezer’s messy follow-up to Blue is foundational for the emo genre, its grunge-like guitars and crashing drums now a signature sound of dozens of following acts. Without Pinkerton, there is no My Chemical Romance, no Fall Out Boy, no Panic! at the Disco. Hell, probably no Billie Eilish or Olivia Rodrigo.

Pinkerton is that important, which makes its initial reception even more divisive as fans and critics hated the album after listening to the poppy and cheery sounds of Blue. On release Pinkerton was a major flop, both with Weezer’s audience and wallet, nearly ending the band as they went into what would be a five-year hiatus. It took over a decade for the public to realize Pinkerton‘s quality and legacy as its themes of loneliness, longing, and sadness permeated popular rock music of the 2000s, audiences and critics now seeing how blind they had been, to turn their heads away from brilliance that was stuck too far ahead of the curve for its own good.

Despite its darker themes and lyrics that express Rivers frustrations with social life, sex, and feelings of loneliness, it’s hard for me to grasp how the first listeners reacted so negatively. Rivers is still hilariously nerdy – from the quirked up “El Scorcho” likening himself to Morrissey reading his muse’s diary amidst images of Asian stereotypes to building up an imaginary life with a crush only to find out they’re gay on “Pink Triangle.”

“The Good Life” proves definitively that Rivers can write the most feral bridges in rock, while “Why Bother?” expands on a Blue melody to corrupt their previous bright sounds with punk and grunge. “Across The Sea” is a little weird, though.

Regardless, it’s a witty album, so listeners shouldn’t feel so scared after coming off of Blue. Underneath that charm is our best glimpse into Rivers’ intimate and disturbed mind that oozes emotions that many can relate to despite not wanting to admit it.

Pinkerton is the best Weezer will ever be because it is Weezer at their purest. Despite the damage from its initial reception, Pinkerton has grown in cult status and critical recognition to be Weezer’s most beloved and divisive album. We’ve never heard anything like it from the band since, and probably never will, though that’s not entirely a bad thing.

Its release gave the band a chance to branch out and experiment in the following decades, and despite the frequent dips in quality, at least the band never burnt out chasing their original sound and acclaim. With a current tally of fifteen studio albums and four EPs planned for this year, their prolific career is their good life, and Weezer isn’t showing any signs of falling off the track yet.