Weezer have earned a reputation as one of rock music’s most divisive bands.
While singer Rivers Cuomo and various incarnations of the Los Angeles–based group have unquestionably been successful (with 35 million records sold worldwide), the quality of their music and their public image have been intensely debated throughout their 30-year career.
The “Hash Pipe” band’s legacy is filled with lineup changes, extended hiatuses and feuds with other iconic bands, all while cementing their place in rock history with 1996’s influential album Pinkerton and a late-career Grammy win in 2009 after largely being snubbed throughout their career.
Weezer band members have faced their fair share of drama away from the stage too, including bassist Scott Shriner’s wife, Jillian Lauren, being arrested in April 2025 following a shootout with Los Angeles police.
Keep scrolling for a look back at the ups and downs of Weezer’s career:
Early Lineup Changes
Cuomo founded Weezer in Los Angeles in 1992 along with bassist Matt Sharp, rhythm guitarist Jason Cropper and drummer Patrick Wilson.
This incarnation of the group only lasted for a year, as Cropper left during the recording of the group’s 1994 self-titled debut album (a.k.a. The Blue Album). Brian Bell replaced Cropper and remains with Weezer to this day.
Weezer bassist Scott Shriner’s wife, Jillian Lauren, was arrested in April 2025 following a police shooting. According to a Los Angeles Police Department statement, Lauren was arrested on April 9, 2025, for felony attempted murder after allegedly firing a handgun at an LAPD officer. Neither Lauren nor Shriner have publicly addressed the incident. The couple […]
Cropper told Addicted to Noise in 1997 that he exerted a strong creative influence in Weezer’s early days, which led to a clash with Cuomo.
“I was in Weezer from the beginning, and even before that, in the pre-Weezer bands. A lot of what is on that first Weezer album was me,” Cropper claimed. “I can hear on the second one how it went from being a collaborative effort to being a [Rivers-led] thing. The parts of Weezer that were acoustic guitar–based on the first one are me, that was my influence and, for a while, we were all on the same page. We all liked Morrissey, The Beatles and The Beach Boys, but where Rivers’ roots come more from the Kiss direction, mine are more from The Who. He’s more into Brian Wilson and I’m more into Pete Townshend.”
The Blue Album was eventually certified platinum five times by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
Matt Sharp’s Exit
Cropper’s departure from Weezer was largely amicable, but the same can’t be said for bassist Sharp’s acrimonious split from the band in 1998.
Sharp was ousted from the group in 1998 following creative clashes with other members and later filed a lawsuit against Weezer in 2002. The musician claimed he was owed royalties from cowriting the hit track “Undone – The Sweater Song” as well contributing to nine songs on their 1996 album, Pinkerton. The lawsuit was eventually settled out of court.
He confirmed to Alternative Press that he was “fired” by the other members of Weezer, yet he has been reluctant to discuss what exactly led to his departure.
“I don’t really know how to speak on this because I don’t know what should be kept private and what should be shared,” Sharp said in 2016. “I certainly have my view of it, as I’m sure everybody else has their sort of foggy things. When you have a group that doesn’t communicate, you’re going to have a whole lot of different stories.”
Sharp was replaced by bassist Mikey Welsh in 1998.
‘Pinkerton’ Controversies
Weezer’s second album was met with withering reviews initially, with some critics complaining that Pinkerton was “sloppy” and “juvenile.” Pinkerton found the group grappling with themes of alienation and disillusionment with their early success, which may not have been entirely relatable to listeners at the time.
Cuomo was notoriously critical of Pinkerton, calling it a “hideous record” that he regretted releasing.
“It was such a hugely painful mistake that happened in front of hundreds of thousands of people and continues to happen on a grander and grander scale and just won’t go away,” he said in 2001. “It’s like getting really drunk at a party and spilling your guts in front of everyone and feeling incredibly great and cathartic about it, and then waking up the next morning and realizing what a complete fool you made of yourself.”
However, Pinkerton found a new generation of supporters in the 2000s, as many Weezer fans now regard it as the band’s masterpiece. The record was certified platinum in 2016 and ranked No. 48 on Rolling Stone’s 100 Greatest Albums of the ’90s list in 2019.
Pinkerton draws its title from a character in the opera Madame Butterfly, who Cuomo described as an “a**hole American sailor similar to a touring rock star.”
Some contemporary criticism centers around how Cuomo wrote about his attraction to Asian women on the album. The singer acknowledged to MTV that he did draw inspiration from several “disastrous encounters with half-Japanese girls” and thus wasn’t proud of some of Pinkerton’s lyrics.
“It developed into disastrous encounters with Asian girls of all sorts. Yeah, I suppose it’s fair to say that I’m fascinated by Asian girls,” he said in 1996. “For some reason, they’re particularly beautiful to me. I don’t know why. And when I became aware of that and also the fact that it was the masculine part of myself that I was learning about in these songs, I remembered the story of Madame Butterfly and the story of the character Pinkerton in that opera.”
Cuomo admitted, “Pinkerton is the ultimate character representing male id who goes to Japan as an American sailor and hooks up with this 15-year-old Japanese girl and gets her pregnant and then abandons her. He’s thoroughly despicable. But I can’t deny that there’s some of that in me.”
Extended Hiatus
Pinkerton’s initial commercial and critical failure took its toll on Weezer, leading to them going on an extended break between 1997 and 2001. Cuomo enrolled in classes at Harvard University in 1997 as a way to detox from the music industry.
Cuomo told Guitar World that taking breaks from Weezer — he’d first attended Harvard for a stretch after The Blue Album’s release in 1994 — were a necessity following the intense scrutiny around their early exploits.
“I knew it was what I had to do, creatively,” he said. “I had to take time off and do nothing except be by myself and think and read and write songs. And I can’t do any of that when I’m on the road because I’m having fun — there’s nothing to write songs about. But as soon as I get off the road and I’m in school, I’m lonely and miserable. Then I start writing.”
Jillian Lauren, the wife of Weezer bassist Scott Shriner, is making headlines following a confrontation with Los Angeles police. Lauren, 51, was shot and injured by police in April 2025, after pointing a handgun at officers from the front yard of her home in LA’s Eagle Rock neighborhood, the LAPD said in a statement. The […]
Cuomo insisted that both his bandmates and their record label were largely supportive of his decision to temporarily walk away from Weezer.
“When you think about it, the normal thing to do when you’re done touring behind an album is to take time off and write songs for the next one. That’s all I did,” he said. “If I hadn’t gone to school — if I had stayed in Los Angeles and hung out at the Viper Room and partied — I surely wouldn’t have written the songs on Pinkerton, and the songs I would have written probably would have sucked. I wouldn’t have found the inspiration.”
Weezer reformed in 2001 with Cuomo, drummer Wilson, guitarist Bell and new bassist Shriner.
‘Africa’ Cover
Weezer had a viral hit with its 2018 cover of the Toto classic “Africa,” as the remake surprisingly became their first No. 1 on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart since 2008’s “Pork and Beans.” The cover came about after a lengthy social media campaign where fans encouraged Weezer to record their own version of the 1982 hit.
Toto initially responded with good humor by covering Weezer’s 2001 hit “Hash Pipe,” but their guitarist Steve Lukather told New and Improved in 2025 that he wasn’t entirely flattered.
“I don’t know about [Cuomo] loving the song, man,” Lukather said. “I don’t think that’s the case at all. I think he did it to take the piss out of it and it blew up in his face and now he’s got to play it every night.”
The musician went on, “I tried to reach out to this guy and be friendly and then it just got weird. I don’t want to get into it, but peace and love. It was good for them, it was good for us.”
Broadway Show Failure
Weezer couldn’t quite parlay the viral success of “Africa” into ambitious plans for a Broadway residency a few years later.
The musicians were set to headline a week-long SZNZ: In Residence on Broadway event at New York City’s Main Stem in September 2022, but the entire concert series was canceled due to low ticket sales one month before opening night.
“I just learned that our Broadway shows have been cancelled (due to low ticket sales and unbelievably high expenses),” Cuomo wrote on Weezer’s Discord server in August 2022. “I’m very sorry to be telling you this now after we’ve already invested so much time, thought, and emotion. Extra apologies to those of you who cleared schedules and made travel plans to be with us. Thanks to @Broadway Producer for all your hard work and great ideas. I loved where we were going and I hope we can find a way to resurrect our vision.”
Weezer ultimately scrapped any plans for a revamped stint on Broadway.
Jillian Lauren Arrest
Scott Shriner, Jillian Lauren. Ron Adar/FilmMagic
In April 2025, Shriner’s wife, Lauren, was involved in a shootout with Los Angeles police after being confronted by LAPD officers outside of her home.
An LAPD statement confirmed, “The officers ordered [Lauren] to drop the handgun numerous times. However, she refused. [Lauren] then pointed the handgun at the officers and an Officer-Involved Shooting occurred.”
Lauren, a true crime author, was “struck by gunfire and fled into her residence,” according to the LAPD. She was eventually arrested when investigators determined she had suffered a “non-life-threatening gunshot wound.”
Sometimes America’s sweethearts go sour. From Morgan Wallen to The Chicks, the biggest names in country music have been at the center of some major controversies. Natalie Maines, Martie Maguire and Emily Strayer found themselves in hot water in the early 2000s after sharing their personal politics on a public stage. While performing across the […]
She was released from custody on $1 million bond after being booked for attempted murder on April 9 and ordered to attend a court hearing on April 30.
Five weeks before her arrest, Lauren confirmed via Instagram that she was undergoing cancer treatment at the Adventist Health Glendale hospital.
“I’m here to thank the incredible oncology team here, who pulled me through a complicated operation without a hitch,” she wrote. “I am always so grateful for every second of the compassionate and excellent medical care I receive in my life.”
