Pinkerton [Deluxe Edition]

The deluxe edition of Pinkerton, Weezer’s 1996 sophomore album, contains bonus tracks, including early recordings of songs, tracks excluded from full release, and live recordings of songs. The deluxe edition also contains some recordings from the highly sought-after Songs From the Black Hole.

Rivers Cuomo, the band’s lead singer and guitarist, wrote all of its songs after a painful leg surgery; as a result, they were written in first-position on his guitar’s fretboard so that he would not have to move too much to play them.

Pinkerton is named after the character B.F. Pinkerton from Puccini’s opera Madama Butterfly, and the album plays as a concept album based loosely around the opera. Like the Puccini opera, the album includes other references to Japan, Japanese people, and Japanese culture from the perspective of an outsider who considers Japan fragile and sensual. It was originally planned as Songs from the Black Hole, which Cuomo deemed a “space opera.” The initial concept was scrapped, but the band incorporated several of the songs into Pinkerton. The artwork on the album’s cover is Kambara yoru no yuki (“Night Snow at Kambara”), a print by Japanese ukiyo-e artist Hiroshige.

The album was seen as a departure from the band’s original power pop sound for a much darker and more abrasive sound. Upon its release in 1996, the album was considered a critical and commercial failure. However, Pinkerton has risen in stature to become one of the most highly-regarded albums of the 1990s, receiving much critical acclaim and is considered one of the most important emo albums of the nineties having introduced the genre to a wider and more mainstream audience. The album was certified gold in 2001 and platinum in 2016. As of September 2016, Pinkerton has amassed U.S. sales of over 1,000,000. It was the last Weezer album to feature bassist Matt Sharp.