Undone – The Sweater Song is a song by Weezer, released on the band’s self-titled debut album. It was released as their debut single in June 24, 1994.
The band originally intended to insert various sound clips into the song but were wary of the cost of licensing them. Instead, the studio version features a spoken introduction by bassist Matt Sharp and longtime friend of the band Karl Koch, as well as dialogue between Koch and Mykel Allan, an early supporter of the band. This dialogue is frequently ad-libbed during concerts and other live recordings.
Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo has commented on the song, saying:
“Undone” is the feeling you get when the train stops and the little guy comes knockin’ on your door. It was supposed to be a sad song, but everyone thinks it’s hilarious.
Cuomo has also said that it was his attempt at writing “a Velvet Underground-type song”, but he later called the song an inadvertent derivative of Metallica’s “Welcome Home (Sanitarium)”, with the band’s metal roots showing through.
The song was originally known as simply “Undone” but the band added “The Sweater Song” to the title after fans at their early shows repeatedly referred to the song as “the sweater song” or “that song about the sweater”.
As Cuomo thought that song titles with parentheses look “ugly”, a dash was used in the title.
The music video for Undone was Weezer‘s first music video. According to Rivers’ Edge: The Weezer Story by John D. Luerssen, the band insisted that the video not have anything to do with a sweater; yet, Geffen received 25 treatments for the video, all involving sweaters.
The video marks one of the early directorial efforts of Spike Jonze, whose pitch was simply “A blue stage, a steadicam, a pack of wild dogs.” The $60,000 video was shot on a steadicam in one unbroken shot, featuring the band playing to a sped up version of the song.
When played at a slower speed, the illusion is created that the band is playing the song in the correct time, yet moving in slow motion. The one shot was taken over 25 times, and the final version is between take number 15 and take number 20, in which the band had abandoned the idea of taking the video seriously at all.
The humor was brought on by the frustration of shooting the same shot over and over to a sped up version of the song as well as the fact that one of the dogs defecated on Patrick Wilson‘s bass drum pedal. The video became an instant hit on MTV. An alternate take of the video can be found on the band’s Video Capture Device DVD.
For their official video for their cover of “Africa”, Weezer used a parody of the “Undone” video with stand-ins for themselves, including Weird Al Yankovic as Cuomo‘s stand-in.
Tracklist:
- Undone – The Sweater Song (LP version)
- Mykel & Carli
- Susanne
- My Evaline (erroneously listed as “Sweet Adeline”)
Weezer
Rivers Cuomo: lead vocals, lead and rhythm guitar
Patrick Wilson: drums
Brian Bell: rhythm guitar
Matt Sharp: bass, backing vocals
Additional personnel
Karl Koch: dialogue, piano
Mykel Allen: dialogue
