Blog Post 6: A Logical View of "Buddy Holly"

Whereas ethos may be the strongest and most obvious rhetorical appeal used by Weezer in "Buddy Holly," logos also plays a near equal role. The song is well led into by a television anchor standing outside Al's Restaurant in Kenosha, Wisconsin from the 70's show "Happy Days." The video then leads into the restaurant where the viewers see owner Al Molinaro and the Weezer band members standing behind him. Al continues to introduce them before the band begins to play.

The restaurant seems fairly trendy with pennants of prominent area college pennants such as Purdue, Wisconsin and Northwestern on the walls and younger teens as patrons. The teens begin to dance around and have a good time when the music starts playing indicating they obviously enjoy it. Much of this plays into the lyrics of the song that talk about how teenagers idolize celebrities and even dress and act like them. Each of the band members dress very similarly to a "Buddy Holly" type look and when the teenagers start dancing along with the music, it hows how the celebrity status of the band instantly makes them good, somewhat regardless of the quality.

After the second time through the chorus, the video takes an intermission with a "To be continued..." across the screen much like the end of an episode or a commercial break as if the video were an episode of the show. This could also show how the trends of what was just said in the chorus ("I look just like Buddy Holly...I don't care about that") will continue as being true. In the 1950s, fads of dressing and acting like celebrities were just starting to become prominent, so by saying that this will continue shows how through the past few generations, we have idolized popular culture in the world.

The title "Buddy Holly" itself indicates the way our minds wrap around a certain key name and take it for all it's worth. Even though there are surely many better names for this song, "Buddy Holly" is very accurate to the theme because it shows the prominence of the celebrity image being the total focal point for the piece.

Blog Post 5: Rhetorical Appeal in Modern Music

Not only does Weezer's "Buddy Holly" music video appeal to a wide range of contexts, but it also connects just as strongly with the three main rhetorical appeals: pathos, ethos and logos. Though the video touches on all three, it most strongly hits ethos.

Throughout the entire video, Weezer's fullest intention is to mimic the 1950's set sitcom, "Happy Days." Obviously, Weezer's music is set to a younger audience, so by creating a parody of an older show, Weezer is gaining respect from older folks watching that may have thought down on the band judging them solely on their chosen musical genre.

Beyond the platform that the video is based around, Weezer also employed the help of former “Happy Days” star Al Molinaro to give an introduction and play a part throughout the video. This again brings up the point of ethos. By having a somewhat-major celebrity in the video, Weezer can play off the appearance that they have “made it” as a band to the point where celebrities will be willing to take part in the band’s music.

Lastly, as the band members are walking off stage after the show, Restaurant owner Al asks Weezer bassist Matt Sharp how he liked the fish, to which Sharp responded, “Not good, Al.” Such a simple statement could be easily overlooked at the end of a video, but in this case, the comment shows humor and with the audience laughter in the background, pushes for a bandwagon affect on the viewer. In fact, in any place in the video where the patrons start dancing or the other “extras” in the video show they are having a good time, Weezer is garnering ethos from the video viewers. Because the people in the video are having a good time, the viewers will gain ethos for the video through their enjoyment. Obviously this touches strongly on pathos as well, but the end result is credibility and acceptability for Weezer as a band and “Buddy Holly” as a song.