| February 23, 2018 | |||||||||
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Lyrics: (Ooh woohoo hoo)
(Ooh woohoo hoo) Oh yeah, oh yeah, what’s that you see? If you’re friends with P (Ooh woohoo hoo) Oh yeah, oh yeah, what’s that you see? If you’re friends with P [Moog solo] (Ooh woo hoo hoo) If you’re friends with P If you’re friends with P Friends of P Get It: Your copy of Return of the Rentals is just a click away. |
Straight from the Department of Nerd Cool—located right next to the Ladies’ Lingerie and Frilly Things Department—comes The Rentals. In 1995, music fans were pleased to see the return of The Rentals even though no one was sure that they’d ever left or when they even came. All they knew was that the infectious melody of Friends of P. was impossible to ignore (if you had a normally functioning sense of rhythm anyway). Interestingly, The Rentals weren’t actually returning from anywhere (unless perhaps they went out for a smoke or something). Return of the Rentals was the band’s first record and the record’s title was a play on the fact that rental items are returned, and likely, it had nothing to do with the band having gone anywhere. The Rentals were formed in 1995 by Matt Sharp, who was the original bassist for Weezer. Sharp left Weezer after the band’s second album, Pinkerton, to form The Rentals. The Rentals were known for the moog¹-driven, poppy rock bits, and Friends of P. was the official poster child for their sound. The band produced two albums before splitting in 1998. The Rentals officially returned in 2005 and released its last record (and EP), Last Little Life, in 2007. In case you are wondering (like me) what “Friends of P.” means, it turns out that the meaning is sort of ho-hum. When The Rentals founder, Matt Sharp, was with Weezer, he became friends with Paulina Porizkova (wife of The Cars’ frontman, Ric Ocasek). Porizkova produced Weezer’s first record and apparently quipped that no one had ever written a song about her. Sharp obliged, and thus, the “P” in “Friends of P” refers to either “Paulina” or “Porizkova.” ¹ A moog is an analog synthesizer created by Robert Moog. Moogs have been used by multiple artists since the 1960s. For example, Gary Numan made extensive use of various moogs to form his eclectic sound (see his 1979 hit, Cars). Video: Here is the official video for The Rentals’ Friends of P. I apologize for the on-screen Russian lyrics, but every online version of the video I found included the lyrics. Consider this to be a quick lesson in speaking Russkie.
The Rentals’ frontman, Matt Sharp, is the bassist (the cat on the left) in this Weezer video for Buddy Holly, which appeared on Weezer’s self-titled debut (referred to by fans as the “Blue Album” because of its blue background). Weezer released several self-titled records using colored backgrounds to differentiate them.
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