For “Song History Saturday” we take a song each week and break down some of the details about the writing, recording, and sometimes the legacy of the song.
You never really forget the first person who believes in you that isn’t in your immediate family. The teacher who knows you’re capable of great things, a coach who tells you you’re an asset to the team, someone who praises a movie you spent the summer making, the man who encouraged you to come up with your first radio segment and gave you positive feedback on it. The same is true for a great number of bands. Some fans- particularly early supporters- can almost become part of the family. That was the story of Weezer with their fans Mykel and Carli Allen, who- along with their sister Trysta- tragically passed away on this day in 1997.
Mykel and Carli Allen were important fans to a number of little-known and/or unsigned Los Angeles-based bands in the early ’90s, with Weezer being one of the fan communities in which they were most active. After being asked to assist in stuffing envelopes for listeners who wrote in, the ladies founded the Weezer Fan Club. They considered Weezer to be “friends. They just happened to play music.”
Rivers Cuomo appreciated the support of the Allen sisters and recognized their importance. Prior to Weezer’s first full-length album (self-titled but commonly referred to as The Blue Album), Cuomo began reworking a demo originally called “Please Pick Up the Phone” (based on the chord progression of “Everybody Plays the Fool” by The Main Ingredient). During his process, he reportedly called the sisters up multiple times, asking them for random details about their teenage years. Once the song was completed, Weezer insisted that the sisters show up for their show in Hollywood. There, they debuted the song “Mykel and Carli” for their biggest fans. The Allen sisters were reportedly (and understandably) emotional.
During the recording of The Blue Album, “Mykel and Carli” was recorded, but was ultimately not included on the final cut. The original recording has since been released, however, a new version was recorded for the b-side of “Undone – The Sweater Song” (released in 1994).
In the wake of The Blue Album, running the Weezer fan club became a bigger task, but one that the Allen sisters took on dutifully. Many fans have recollections of ways in which the Allen sisters were helpful and welcoming to them. Famously, devoted fans of The Grateful Dead known as “Deadheads” used to essentially go on the road to see as many Grateful Dead shows as they could. The Allen sisters did likewise as Weezer moved on from local shows in California to touring the U.S. During the second half of Weezer’s Pinkerton tour, The Allen sisters traveled to many of their shows in order to support the band and meet up with other fan club members. After a show in Colorado, the Allen sisters were involved in a car accident that resulted in their deaths.
Weezer expected to see the ladies at their next show and began to grow uneasy after two shows passed without sign of the sisters. In the days before cell phones were widespread and the internet was in its early days, it took the news much longer to travel to Weezer but they found out on the way to their third show since Colorado.
Just over a month after their passing, a tribute concert was organized with proceeds going toward helping their family pay for funeral expenses. Bands Mykel and Carli had loved joined forces for the show. Black Market Flowers reformed to play the show after having broken up. The concert represented the final performance for that dog, who broke up just a month later. It was the last Weezer show Matt Sharp ever played as well as being Weezer’s final show for three years. A great many elements contributed to Weezer’s hiatus between the conclusion of the Pinkerton tour and their reformation for The Green Album, but the death of their biggest fans certainly played a part.
Prior to the show’s encore, the Allen sisters’ father came out on stage to deliver a message of hope and love to the crowd, thanking fans from around the world for their kind words. Following his speech, a distraught Cuomo returned to the stage to perform a moving, slowed-down solo performance of “Mykel and Carli,” the lyrics of which took on a new meaning, particularly the line “the school bus came//and took my friends away.”
Weezer would not play the song live again until 2012. Though other fans tried to keep the fan club going, it was never the same after the death of the founders. As message boards and fan sites grew in popularity, the mailing-list-style fan club began to disappear. Mykel and Carli were some of the last of their kind. Weezer was far from the only band that wrote songs about the sisters. The aforementioned Black Market Flowers wrote the first “Mykel and Carli,” before Weezer. In 1998, an album was organized as a further tribute to the Allen family, Hear You Me! (named from the line in Weezer’s “Mykel and Carli.” The album featured contributions from other Los Angeles-based bands that had known the ladies, as well as some who just wanted to contribute to the project. A poem Mykel Allen had written was even recorded by Steve Stadfelt. On Jimmy Eat World’s landmark 2001 album Bleed American, they borrow the same line from “Mykel and Carli” for the title of their song about the Allen sisters, “Hear You Me.”
When Weezer finally reformed for The Green Album, the album was dedicated to the memory of the Allen sisters.
-Just Emma (JustEmma@CD929FM.com)
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