OK Human

Work on OK Human began as early as 2017, when the band decided to make an album that combined rock instrumentation with an orchestra. Producer Jake Sinclair suggested that they hire a 38-piece orchestra and also gave Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo the album Nilsson Sings Newman to listen to, on which singer Harry Nilsson covered songs by Randy Newman. They had just finished production on the album when they got an offer to join bands Green Day and Fall Out Boy on the Hella Mega Tour for the summer of 2020. This prompted them to start work on another album, Van Weezer, which featured music that would translate better to a stadium tour, but when the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the tour, they decided to switch around the release dates of the albums once again. The album was planned to be released following their intended fourteenth album, Van Weezer, but when the album suffered a year-long delay following the COVID-19 pandemic, the band hinted that they were shifting their focus to completing OK Human first. On November 17, 2020, the band announced the completion of OK Human during a Q&A session following a livestream performance. On January 18, 2021, the band announced a release date of January 29 with the release date of the lead single, "All My Favorite Songs" on January 21. The album's title is a play on the 1997 Radiohead album OK Computer. The cover art was illustrated by Mattias Adolfsson. ==Composition==

Musically, OK Human has been described as orchestral pop, chamber pop, baroque pop, pop, and pop rock. ==Critical reception==

OK Human received generally favorable reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the release received an average score of 75, based on 21 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Similarly, R.A. Hagan, writing for Clash Music, praised the album for being "more careful, sincere, and delicately crafted" than the band's previous two studio albums, Pacific Daydream and the Black Album. Aaron Mook of Chorus.fm recommended the album, calling it "a left-field masterpiece that comes dangerously close to reaching the heights of the band's early career." However, publications like Entertainment Weekly and Pitchfork were more critical of the album. Writing for Pitchfork, Ian Cohen wrote that the album felt "as impersonal as water-cooler small talk". Eli Enis wrote for Entertainment Weekly that "the fleeting moments of authenticity are hidden beneath a pile of hokey one-liners, spotty vocal performances, and awkward arrangements that rely on the accompanying orchestra to provide all of the emotional depth", but still noted that "it's arguably the darkest and most personal record that Cuomo has written since his fans' beloved Pinkerton." Other music critics were more ambivalent in their judgement of the album. Writing for Consequence of Sound, Tyler Clark concluded; "Chalk it up to the unpredictability of 2021; despite the creative and cultural headwinds into which it was released, OK Human lands as a surprisingly charming collection of pop tunes whose imperfections add to rather than detract from the experience." In the review for The Line of Best Fit, Alex Wisgard stated that "Weezer’s greatest misses may come from their frontman’s visceral desperation to stay relevant, but it’s a relief to hear them take chances and risk failure in such a new way. The album might just be OK, but it’s been a long time since Weezer have dared to be this human." == Track listing ==

Personnel taken from OK Human liner notes, except where noted. Weezer • Rivers Cuomo – lead vocals, piano • Brian Bell – acoustic guitar, organ, backing vocals • Patrick Wilson – drums, backing vocals • Scott Shriner – bass, backing vocals Production • Jake Sinclair – producer • Suzy Shinn – vocal producer, engineer • Jonathan Allen – chief engineer, orchestra engineer (Abbey Road) • William Wittman – chief engineer, orchestra engineer (Van Gelder) • William Carroll – engineer • Zach Fisher – engineer • Brian Fombona – engineer • Perry Margouleff – engineer • Paul Pritchard – engineer • Maureen Sickler – engineer • Rachel White – engineer • Lawton Burris – assistant engineer • Andy Maxwell – assistant engineer • Branko Presley – assistant engineer • Karl Wingate – assistant engineer • Lazaro Zarate – assistant engineer • John Sinclair – mixing • Pete Lyman – mastering Additional musicians • Rob Mathes – string, horn, and woodwind arrangements, conducting • Abbey Road String Section (all except "All My Favorite Songs") • Julian Leaper – concertmaster, first violin • Steve Morris, Patrick Kiernan, Tom Pigott-Smith, Magnus Johnston, Pete Hanson, Mark Berrow, Paul Willey, Natalia Bonner, Cathy Thompson – violin • Kate Musket, Andy Parker, Lydia Lowndes-Northcott – viola • Martin Loveday, Dave Daniels, Ian Burdge – cello • Van Gelder String, Wind, and Horn Sections • Lisa Kim – concertmaster; first violin on "All My Favorite Songs" and "Numbers" • Sharon Yamada, Joanna Maurer, Ann Lehmann, Matt Lehmann, Jung Sun Yoo, Peter Bahng – violin on "All My Favorite Songs" and "Numbers" • Becky Young, Michael Roth, Will Frampton – viola on "All My Favorite Songs" and "Numbers" • Alan Stepansky, Joel Noyes – cello on "All My Favorite Songs" and "Numbers" • Ray Riccomini, Tony Kadleck – trumpet • Erik Ralske, Anne Sharer – French horn • John Romero, Ryan Keberle – trombone • Tara Helen O'Connor – flute, piccolo • Pavel Vinnitsky – clarinet, bass clarinet • Keisuke Ikuma – English horn, oboe • Dan Shelly – bassoon, contrabassoon ==Charts==