Return of the Rentals was well received by critics and produced the successful single "Friends of P.", which peaked at number 7 on Billboard's Modern Rock Tracks chart and received significant airplay on MTV's 120 Minutes. Despite this, the album only managed to reach number 19 on the BillboardHeatseeker Albums chart, and by 1999 the album had sold 96,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan.[3][4]
In a 2019 Reddit AMA, Matt Sharp revealed that the artwork and the master tapes of Return of the Rentals have either been lost or destroyed by the record label, meaning a reissue of the album is unlikely.[5]
Background
The "P" in the track "Friends of P." has had multiple theories presented as to its meaning. The actual "P" in the song refers to Paulina Porizkova, the wife of The Cars guitarist Ric Ocasek, who produced the first Weezer album, known as The Blue Album.[6] Porizkova made a claim that no one had ever written a song about her, and so Sharp took on the task. Ocasek noted that he found the subject matter of the song a bit odd. Fictitious theories suggest that "P" refers to the Psychic Friends Network or Patrick Wilson, who played drums for both The Rentals and Weezer.
"Please Let That Be You" was originally written by Sharp and Rivers Cuomo as a song called "Mrs. Young", a spiritual counterpart to Weezer's song "Jamie". On one demo, Rivers Cuomo helps Sharp, doing extra instrumentation and backup vocals. At one point, Weezer considered recording both "Jamie" with "Mrs. Young" (later written as "Please Let That Be You" without Rivers Cuomo but instead with Rachel Haden) as its B-side for a single, but this never happened.
Return of the Rentals received generally favorable reviews from critics.[12]Entertainment Weekly claimed, "Its winsome love songs make for good, clean, disposable fun."[8]Q compared the Rentals' work to the early work of the Cars: "The Rentals root themselves in the sound of late-’70s US new wave; the result is in many senses reminiscent of The Cars' earlier material."[11]NME wrote that "despite its pretensions to [be] meaningless electro-pop, it can't help but have depth".[9]Pitchfork's Ryan Schreiber enjoyed the band's attempt to bring back Moog synthesizers.[10]
In a retrospective review, Peter D'Angelo of AllMusic praised the album, saying, "Return of the Rentals is a real benchmark of carefree pop from the '90s, and shouldn't be forgotten anytime soon."[7]
Legacy
"Waiting" appeared in the 1997 horror anthology film Campfire Tales. The song plays in a character's bedroom during the film's third segment, titled "People Can Lick Too".[13]
In 2006, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs covered "The Love I'm Searching For" on AOL's The Interface podcast.[14] In 2008, Ash covered "Please Let That Be You" for the album Friends of P. -- Tribute to The Rentals. "Friends of P." was covered by Tokyo Police Club on their album Elephant Shell Remixes and sampled by Girl Talk on his 2006 album Night Ripper.
Tera Melos guitarist Nick Reinhart uploaded a cover of the track "These Days" to SoundCloud.[15]
Track listing
All tracks are written by Matt Sharp except "My Summer Girl" by Cherielynn Westrich and Matt Sharp
