POP MUSIC REVIEW : Weezer Makes a Stand as Regular-Guy Band

Weezer isn’t a lot of things. Though many of the band’s songs have a tart, Pixies-like melodic quality, they aren’t weirdly surreal. Weezer’s sound is informed by the likes of Brian Wilson and the Beatles, but they never completely abandon themselves to the pristine pop impulse. The punky perkiness of the group’s music bespeaks its kinship with Offspring and Green Day, yet Weezer isn’t acutely clever or snottily discontent.

Weezer is a bunch of regular guys, and on Saturday night they rocked a packed Hollywood Palladium with a regular set (no encores, thank you) of regular-guy rock, which began with the band’s rendering of the theme from “Magnum, P.I.”--a regular-guy ode if there ever was one.

Frontman and introvert extraordinaire Rivers Cuomo interfaced with the youthful crowd, bashfully donning a couple of hats thrown on stage by exuberant audience members. Guitarist Brian Bell and bassist Matt Sharp capered with restraint, taking care not to upstage Cuomo. After their intensely sedate leader left the stage at the end of the set, Sharp took up a wig and guitar and initiated a crazed ax duel with Bell.

Ultimately, stage presence wasn’t an issue. While there’s little in Weezer’s approach to make them essential, there is enough of that disarming regular-guy charm to appeal to the regular guy in all of us.