Despite a somewhat confusing title “Return of the Rentals”, this is the debut album of the band, The Rentals. If you were unaware beforehand, The Rentals were founded and fronted by zany ex-Weezer bassist, Matt Sharp with his portrait on the album cover to showcase that.  It was released in 1995 between Weezer’s beloved first two albums Blue and Pinkerton respectively and suitably doesn’t sound out of place alongside them.

It was a bit puzzling at the time of it release to see Matt fronting his own band right in the middle of Weezer’s rise to success. Was Matt Sharp being held back as merely a bassist and back-up vocalist? Well, not quite. While Return of The Rentals is a fine collection of 10 synth-driven pop songs with a lot of crunchy distorted and detuned guitars, the songs are elevated by the surrounding cast of musicians backing up Matt. There is another member of Weezer on drums in Pat Wilson, violinist Petra Haden and co-vocalist Cherielynn Westrich. The addition of Cherielynn added a nice mixed gender dynamic to the vocals, which gave Matt a break from the falsetto vocals that he characteristically delivered in Weezer.

Chalk this album up as a fine, but lighter companion to Weezer’s classic albums of the 90s spawning a hit in the infectious “Friends Of P”. Pop it in if you feel like geek-rockiing out and playing air synthesizers wearing your old thick rimmed glasses and perhaps a retro grey suit too.