If you’ve been a bit fed-up with Weezer’s recent attachment to soft-rock covers and beach-inspired music (guilty), today is chock-full of excellent news. Not only is the band announcing a tour with Green Day (yay) and Fall Out Boy (eh), but Weezer just released its first new single, and for those who prefer their Weezer less mellow, more rocking, it’s the band’s best song in years.
The upcoming album title, Van Weezer, is a spot-on moniker for what’s in store: fun, frantic guitar-god-driven rock, inspired by the likes of the glory years of Van Halen and Def Leppard. Rivers Cuomo has obviously always wanted to be a straight-up rock star (just take a look at that band logo), and with “The End Of The Game,” Weezer straight up embraces its hair-band-sounding inevitability. Not that we’re really expecting perms and latex to make a comeback (although that ET-inspired video is decidedly retro), but who cares: If the rest of Van Weezer sounds as joyously rocking as this keg-stand soundtrack, it could make Pinkerton an even more distant memory (blasphemy, we know). This is the kind of music the sign of the devil was made for, so enjoy.