“Sober Up” by Ajr featuring Rivers Cuomo

"Sober Up" comes off The Click, AJR's second album from 2017, and it's the Met brothers doing what they do best: bouncy, bright pop wrapped around a lump in the throat. Jack and Ryan came up with it at Columbia University while missing their childhoods, and the loneliness shows, down to a scene of Jack phoning his second-grade crush. The trick is that it sounds cheerful anyway, a sugar rush with sad eyes.

Then Rivers Cuomo followed the band on Twitter, the admiration turned out to be mutual, and the Weezer frontman was sent the unfinished track, writing and singing its bridge himself. AJR produced and mixed it in-house. Released as the album's fifth single, it gave the band their first number one on Billboard's Alternative Songs chart in March 2018 and handed Cuomo his first outside Weezer. Some stations still spin a version with Ryan singing Cuomo's part.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.